cryptic
Americanadjective
-
mysterious in meaning; puzzling; ambiguous.
a cryptic message.
- Synonyms:
- enigmatic
-
abrupt; terse; short.
a cryptic note.
-
secret; occult.
a cryptic writing.
-
involving or using cipher, code, etc.
-
Zoology. fitted for concealing; serving to camouflage.
noun
adjective
-
hidden; secret; occult
-
(esp of comments, sayings, etc) obscure in meaning
-
(of the coloration of animals) tending to conceal by disguising or camouflaging the shape
Related Words
See ambiguous.
Other Word Forms
- cryptically adverb
- noncryptic adjective
- noncryptical adjective
- noncryptically adverb
Etymology
Origin of cryptic
1595–1605; < Late Latin crypticus < Greek kryptikós hidden. See crypt, -ic
Explanation
"White bunny. Moon square." Do you understand what that means? Of course not! It's totally cryptic. Cryptic comments or messages are hard to understand because they seem to have a hidden meaning. Cryptic is from Late Latin crypticus, from Greek kryptos, "hidden." This Greek adjective is the source of the English noun crypt, referring to a room under a church in which dead people are buried. That might account for why the word cryptic has an eerie tone to it.
Vocabulary lists containing cryptic
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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.
He punctuated a day of conflicting messaging with a cryptic social media post: “Tuesday, 8:00 P.M. Eastern Time!”
From Barron's • Apr. 6, 2026
The claimants had a leaked "ledger" of Associated Newspaper payments, invoices from some private investigators and extracts from reporters notepads with cryptic handwritten details of payments to sources.
From BBC • Mar. 31, 2026
Her concurrence is too cryptic, though, to be of much use to lower courts trying to make sense of Gorsuch’s maximalist rhetoric.
From Slate • Mar. 31, 2026
He approaches historical developments from odd angles as if deliberately trying to be cryptic.
From The Wall Street Journal • Mar. 25, 2026
He brooded in ponderous speculation over the cryptic message he had just received.
From "Catch-22" by Joseph Heller
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
