botched

American

[bocht] / bɒtʃt /

adjective

spoiled by poor or clumsy work; bungled.

The teachers are up in arms about the botched rollout of the new standards, which caused unnecessary confusion and stress for them and their students.

verb

the simple past tense and past participle of botch.

Other Word Forms

botchedly

adverb

Etymology

Origin of botched

botch ¹ ( def. ) + -ed ² ( def. )

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

Stilwell, who refrains from sharing his first name, operates on Catalina Island, a dumping ground for officers who’ve either botched cases or run afoul of their superiors.

From The Wall Street Journal • May 22, 2026

It is a dramatic turnaround for a sector that crashed to 48,000 tonnes in 2008 in the wake of a botched government land reform programme that led to the seizure of hundreds of commercial farms.

From Barron's • May 15, 2026

Fleeing a botched con and the threat of wartime violence, 29-year-old Ulises Linares escapes 1943 Mexico City for the small town of Puerco Ahogado in Veracruz.

From Los Angeles Times • May 12, 2026

Investors have been especially displeased with the botched rollout of Apple Intelligence, which was first announced in 2024 but has been continuously delayed.

From MarketWatch • Apr. 20, 2026

He was definitely of middle age, but whoever had done his operation had botched it.

From "Uglies" by Scott Westerfeld

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023