convoluted

[ kon-vuh-loo-tid ]

adjective

1. twisted; coiled.
2. complicated; intricately involved:

   a convoluted way of describing a simple device.

convoluted

/ ˈkɒnvəˌluːtɪd /

adjective

1. (esp of meaning, style, etc) difficult to comprehend; involved
2. wound together; coiled

Derived Forms

• ˈconvoˌlutedly, adverb
• ˈconvoˌlutedness, noun

Other Words From

• convo·luted·ly adjective
• convo·luted·ness noun
• un·convo·luted adjective

Word History and Origins

Origin of convoluted¹

First recorded in 1805–15; convolute + -ed ²

Example Sentences

“The kill-chain is very convoluted,” one combat-experienced Air Force A-10 Warthog pilot told The Daily Beast.

From The Daily Beast

Which is why his efforts to justify his rabid consumption of football wind up feeling so slippery and convoluted.

From The Daily Beast

The legal path for the Tea Party candidate to take the fight to the courts though is still somewhat convoluted.

From The Daily Beast

The House Republicans made headlines Thursday with their convoluted immigration plan.

From The Daily Beast

And so even the greatest TV series tend to be bogged down by endless—and endlessly convoluted—second acts.

From The Daily Beast

It is large in the anthropoid apes, especially in the orang, in which it is very long and spirally convoluted.

From Project Gutenberg

Sometimes it rolled sullenly, and convoluted in oily surges beneath its coverlid of snow, like a bed of monstrous serpents.

From Project Gutenberg

You call a cigar a "convoluted weed," and so on, you know; that passes for facetiousness.

From Project Gutenberg

The female is more brightly coloured than the male, and has a convoluted trachea, elsewhere a masculine character.

From Project Gutenberg

While the convoluted intestines are like the roots of a tree, absorbing nurture for it from environment.

From Project Gutenberg

Related Words

• intricate
• labyrinthine
• perplexing
• puzzling
• tangled
• tortuous