unrecognizable
Britishadjective
Explanation
Anything that's unrecognizable can't be identified, often because it has changed so much. If your brother's Halloween costume is so elaborate that you can't even tell it's him under all that makeup, he's unrecognizable. This adjective is often used for things that have been badly damaged: "After the hurricane's destruction, the town was unrecognizable." You can also use it in a more positive way: "Once my bike was repaired and painted it was completely unrecognizable!" Unrecognizable comes from the prefix un-, or "not," and the Latin recognoscere, "recall to mind or know again."
Vocabulary lists containing unrecognizable
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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.
Their task is to develop transferable skills to thrive in a working world that may turn out to be unrecognizable.
From The Wall Street Journal • May 28, 2026
At a Dr. Jack seminar held in a furniture store, Cheadle’s unrecognizable cameo competes with kids jumping on a couch and a spasmodic massage chair pummeling Corvette’s face.
From Los Angeles Times • May 21, 2026
But now it’s so different from when it made its debut that it would be almost unrecognizable to its creators.
From The Wall Street Journal • May 3, 2026
What Israeli filmmaker Nadav Lapid is out to evoke is bone-deep submission: the kind of total capitulation and surrender that makes a person unrecognizable even to themselves.
From Los Angeles Times • Apr. 3, 2026
We found nothing, and soon our clothes were washed over with mud and we were unrecognizable from the children who lived on the streets.
From "The Joy Luck Club" by Amy Tan
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.
