illegibility
Cannot be read
Illegibility is the quality of being impossible or difficult to read.
Handwriting may have illegibility from sloppiness or haste; a document may have illegibility from age, damage, or poor printing.
The word applies to anything meant to be read but failing at that purpose: The illegibility of the prescription worried the pharmacist.
Careless, illegible writing
- scribbleWrite without care
- indecipherableImpossible to understand
- messyLacking order or neatness
- crampedUncomfortably lacking space
spidery · smudged · blurred · squiggles · inkblot · jagged · disjointed · unformed
Confused and unintelligible
- gibberishUnintelligible speech or writing
- unintelligibleImpossible to understand
- incomprehensibleImpossible to understand
- undecipherableImpossible to interpret
blurry · faint · smeared · obscured · pixelated · corrupted · distorted · degraded
Specialized professional vocabulary
- legaleseAttorneys' technical jargon
- redactedOfficially removed from view
- obfuscatedMade deliberately unclear
- convolutedExcessively complex or twisted
dense · impenetrable · opaque · labyrinthine · byzantine · technical · inaccessible · incomprehensible
scrawl
Careless, illegible writing
- scribbleWrite without care
- indecipherableImpossible to understand
- messyLacking order or neatness
cramped · spidery · smudged · blurred · squiggles · inkblot · jagged · disjointed · unformed · looped
garbled
Confused and unintelligible
- gibberishUnintelligible speech or writing
- unintelligibleImpossible to understand
- incomprehensibleImpossible to understand
undecipherable · blurry · faint · smeared · obscured · pixelated · corrupted · distorted · degraded · unreadable
jargon
Specialized professional vocabulary
- legaleseAttorneys' technical jargon
- redactedOfficially removed from view
- obfuscatedMade deliberately unclear
convoluted · dense · impenetrable · opaque · labyrinthine · byzantine · technical · inaccessible · incomprehensible · indecipherable
cryptic
Obscure in meaning
arcane · cryptogram · obscured · opaque · inscrutable · esoteric · symbolic · notation · undecoded · steganography
illegibilitylegibility
Clearness of text
readability · clarity · clearness · distinctness · sharpness
illegibilityreadability
Ease of understanding text
intelligibility · comprehensibility · clarity · accessibility · transparency
collect, legend, legal, select, lecture, illegal, legitimate, intellect, illegally