elliptical
Americanadjective
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pertaining to or having the form of an ellipse.
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pertaining to or marked by grammatical ellipsis.
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(of speech or writing) expressed with extreme or excessive economy; relieved of irrelevant matter.
to converse in elliptical sentences.
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(of a style of speaking or writing) tending to be ambiguous, cryptic, or obscure.
an elliptical prose that is difficult to translate.
noun
adjective
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relating to or having the shape of an ellipse
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relating to or resulting from ellipsis
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very condensed or concise, often so as to be obscure or ambiguous
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circumlocutory or long-winded
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Usage
The use of elliptical to mean circumlocutory should be avoided as it may be interpreted wrongly as meaning condensed or concise
Other Word Forms
- elliptically adverb
- ellipticalness noun
- nonelliptic adjective
- nonelliptical adjective
- nonelliptically adverb
- overelliptical adjective
- overelliptically adverb
- subelliptic adjective
- subelliptical adjective
- unelliptical adjective
Etymology
Origin of elliptical
1650–60; < Greek elleiptik ( ós ) defective ( ellipsis, -tic ) + -al 1
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.
Published when its author was 28 years old, the slim, elliptical volume played a central role in Camus winning the Nobel Prize for literature at a time when that distinction still meant something.
From The Wall Street Journal • Apr. 2, 2026
Some exoplanets follow highly elliptical orbits, meaning the amount of heat they receive from their star changes significantly over time.
From Science Daily • Mar. 25, 2026
The Moon's orbit around the Earth is not circular but elliptical, meaning that the distance between the two varies throughout the year.
From BBC • Oct. 4, 2025
Librettist Gene Scheer distilled Michael Chabon’s sprawling, Pulitzer Prize-winning book from 2000 into a straightforward, primary-colored plot, losing much of its magical, elliptical atmosphere.
From The Wall Street Journal • Sep. 23, 2025
He found the Veranda Cafe, its walls painted with Venetian scenes and featuring a large elliptical dance floor.
From "The Boys in the Boat: Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics" by Daniel James Brown
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.
