decipher

verb de·ci·pher \ dē-ˈsī-fər \

|Updated on: 14 Jun 2018

Examples: decipher in a Sentence

Definition of decipher

transitive verb

1 : decode 1a

decipher a secret message

2 obsolete : depict

with her majesty's name deciphered in gold letters
—Jonathan Swift

3 a : to make out the meaning of despite indistinctness or obscurity

trying to decipher her handwriting

b : to interpret the meaning of

decipher the poem

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decipherable

play \-f(ə-)rə-bəl\ adjective

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decipherer

play \-fər-ər\ noun

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decipherment

play \-fər-mənt\ noun

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Examples of decipher in a Sentence

I couldn't decipher his sloppy handwriting.
we deciphered the hidden message to find out when we were supposed to meet

Recent Examples of decipher from the Web

There is so much information that the executive must decipher and so many facets of the operations that go beyond scouting.

— zach berman, Philly.com, "Carson Wentz's progress an important story in busy week of Eagles news | Early Birds," 7 June 2018
The conglomerate is, at the behest of the government, developing software that will decipher accents and automatically transcribe what’s said for air traffic controllers.

— anurag kotoky, Bloomberg.com, "Honeywell to Make Flying Safer by Decoding 100 Accents in India," 5 June 2018
Naturally, there are deathbed statements to ponder, enigmatic codes to decipher and shocking secrets to unearth in the bowels of the Library of Congress, where all the most shocking secrets are kept (Shhhhh).

— ron charles, chicagotribune.com, "Jake Tapper's new thriller blows the lid off corruption in Washington," 24 Apr. 2018
This week, don’t worry so much about balancing and deciphering each part of yourself.

— claire comstock-gay, The Cut, "Madame Clairevoyant: Horoscopes for the Week of February 5," 5 Feb. 2018
Simply filing a legitimate grievance can be difficult, too, as forms and instructions are not easily retrieved and deciphered across the circuits.

— joan biskupic, CNN, "Panel set to release report on judges and sexual harassment," 16 May 2018
The results are impressive, if a little hard to decipher, according to Ifat Levy, a neuroscientist at the Yale University School of Medicine who did not work on the new study.

— angus chen, Scientific American, "Did You Buy Bitcoins? Your Brain’s Anatomy Might Be to Blame," 5 Apr. 2018
The increase after the Florida shooting has law enforcement agencies across the U.S. strapped, going to school after school to decipher whether there is any real threat to children seeking an education.

— christal hayes, USA TODAY, "After Florida shooting, more than 600 copycat threats have targeted schools," 7 Mar. 2018
And led to some other key innovations, such as algorithms than can mine new asteroids out of the data stream in real time, so that humans aren't wasting hours deciphering what's an asteroid and what's just a star.

— Popular Mechanics, "The Asteroid Hunters," 11 Nov. 2015

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'decipher.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.