misdirect
Americanverb (used with object)
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misdirects,
present (3rd person singular)
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misdirected,
past participle, past
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misdirecting
present participle
verb
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to give (a person) wrong directions or instructions
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to address (a letter, parcel, etc) wrongly
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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misdirectsimple
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misdirectssimple
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have misdirectedperfect
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has misdirectedperfect
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am misdirectingprogressive
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are misdirectingprogressive
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is misdirectingprogressive
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have been misdirectingperfect progressive
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has been misdirectingperfect progressive
Past
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misdirectedsimple
-
had misdirectedperfect
-
was misdirectingprogressive
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were misdirectingprogressive
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had been misdirectingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of misdirect
Vocabulary lists containing misdirect
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.
See Examples For:
Campbell appealed, saying one of her fellow trustees, lawyer Bianka Hellmich, forged her signature and impersonated her using a fake email address to misdirect money that was intended for the charity.
From BBC ● Oct. 1, 2026
They are so smart, often harder to misdirect, harder to kind of just psychologically go the way that you predict.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 16, 2025
We can’t afford to let the banks misdirect us again.
From Slate ● Mar. 22, 2024
“Baylor’s focus of media attention on football tried to misdirect attention from institutional failures of the Baylor administration. Our clients would have none of that,” Dunn said.
From Seattle Times ● Sep. 18, 2023
“Somehow we think it is funny to misdirect people and we don’t smile when we do it, but we laugh inwardly. It is our nature.”
From "Travels with Charley in Search of America" by John Steinbeck
He dazzles and misdirects, prods and pokes, changes topics midsentence and frequently offers claims that are on their face so bizarre that they demand repetition by the media, if only to be discounted.
From Washington Post ● Oct. 24, 2019
My brother and I worked really hard in the writing to answer all the questions for ourselves, but then to create all these misdirects for the audience.
From The Verge ● Oct. 18, 2019
The writer advised readers to avoid a chessboard “as they would an adder’s nest” because “chess misdirects and exhausts their intellectual energies.”
From Salon ● Aug. 13, 2016
A master magician with words, Deaver misdirects with one tale while what's really going on is just off the reader's radar.
From Seattle Times ● Jun. 3, 2013
Knowledge is valuable for action, and error is chiefly hurtful in so far as it misdirects conduct.
From Illusions A Psychological Study by James Sully
It is claimed these invalidated his advice and "infected" the secretary of state's decision and Sir Chris showed "scatter gun decision-making" and had "misdirected himself".
From BBC ● Oct. 19, 2026
But, if he wrote to prove genius as a prognosticator, it’s a misdirected column.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 19, 2026
That wasn’t an act of misdirected reverence but a refusal of reverence.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 16, 2026
By the time couples notice, the pressure is already there, and it often gets misdirected at each other.
From MarketWatch ● Feb. 20, 2026
Gale knows his anger at Madge is misdirected.
From "The Hunger Games" by Suzanne Collins
"That gets worse in the summer when the water is moving slowly, and some of that is historic, but also a contemporary misdirecting of sewage into storm drains."
From BBC ● Sep. 30, 2026
Furious, Strowger blamed the operators for misdirecting calls meant for him to his competitors, and set about inventing a bias-free, electromechanical machine to replace them.
From Seattle Times ● Jan. 26, 2024
As Elizabeth asks questions of Gracie, she is fishing for insights into her character — and Gracie may be withholding or even misdirecting.
From Salon ● Dec. 1, 2023
In a 2013 lawsuit, Harry accused Daniel of misdirecting $6.5 million in corporate funds “for the purpose of advancing the international cart racing activities” of his sons, Logan and Dalton; that litigation was eventually settled.
From New York Times ● May 13, 2023
Deliberately misdirecting a call would not be an infraction, it would be grounds for dismissal.
From "The Brightwood Code" by Monica Hesse
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Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
