Bafflegab

//ˈbæfəlɡæb// noun, verb

noun, verb ·Uncommon ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    Pretentious, incomprehensible, or overly technical language, especially legal or bureaucratic jargon. uncountable

    "Toss in a few technical terms that most people don't understand—"stochastic" this, "regression" that—and you can use people's justified respect for math and science to get them nodding along. This is granularity as bafflegab."

Verb
  1. 1
    To use pretentious, incomprehensible, or overly technical language. rare

Example

More examples

"Toss in a few technical terms that most people don't understand—"stochastic" this, "regression" that—and you can use people's justified respect for math and science to get them nodding along. This is granularity as bafflegab."

Etymology

From baffle + gab, coined 1952.

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.