1
as in spell
a spoken word or set of words believed to have magic power
originally, an abracadabra was a cryptogram of the word "abracadabra" that was repeated in diminishing form until it disappeared entirely—supposedly just like the targeted evil or misfortune
Synonyms & Similar Words
Relevance
2
as in nonsense
unintelligible or meaningless talk
after some abracadabra the spiritualist announced that we had made contact with "the other side"
Synonyms & Similar Words
Example Sentences
Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to
show current usage.
Read More
Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors.
Send us feedback.
Recent Examples of abracadabra
What could be more fun than some abracadabra and cathartic wealth redistribution?
—
Bilge Ebiri, Vulture, 13 Nov. 2025
There is nothing to choose between them, but there was a consistency, clinical edge and an abracadabra touch that made this performance the best Alcaraz has played in a major final, barring that 2024 demolition of Novak Djokovic on Centre Court.
—Tim Ellis, Forbes.com, 8 Sep. 2025
That’s seven steps to make abracadabra, whose molecular assembly number is thus seven.
—Sarah Scoles, Scientific American, 13 Jan. 2023
Make the Boston Celtics vanish on abracadabra?
—Jeff Zillgitt, USA TODAY, 18 May 2022
And there’s an abracadabra quality of pulling a bed out nowhere.
—Christine Lennon, Sunset Magazine, 11 Feb. 2022
But Trump’s Hollywood gambits well surpass that obvious bit of abracadabra.
—Steven Zeitchik, The Hollywood Reporter, 3 Sep. 2019
His utilization of terms like irreducible complexity is about as substantive as chanting abracadabra, but probably just as effective in convincing fellow travelers already sympathetic to his position as shamans were in the days of yore.
—Razib Khan, Discover Magazine, 5 Sep. 2011
Bilge Ebiri, Vulture, 13 Nov. 2025
There is nothing to choose between them, but there was a consistency, clinical edge and an abracadabra touch that made this performance the best Alcaraz has played in a major final, barring that 2024 demolition of Novak Djokovic on Centre Court.
—Tim Ellis, Forbes.com, 8 Sep. 2025
That’s seven steps to make abracadabra, whose molecular assembly number is thus seven.
—Sarah Scoles, Scientific American, 13 Jan. 2023
Make the Boston Celtics vanish on abracadabra?
—Jeff Zillgitt, USA TODAY, 18 May 2022
And there’s an abracadabra quality of pulling a bed out nowhere.
—Christine Lennon, Sunset Magazine, 11 Feb. 2022
But Trump’s Hollywood gambits well surpass that obvious bit of abracadabra.
—Steven Zeitchik, The Hollywood Reporter, 3 Sep. 2019
His utilization of terms like irreducible complexity is about as substantive as chanting abracadabra, but probably just as effective in convincing fellow travelers already sympathetic to his position as shamans were in the days of yore.
—Razib Khan, Discover Magazine, 5 Sep. 2011
Recent Examples of Synonyms for abracadabra
Noun
-
There was no hot water for several spells last winter.—
Anne Kadet,
Curbed,
15 May 2026
-
Over the course of Obsession's 108-minute runtime, Nikki transforms into an self-destructive, possessive, and dangerously violent shadow of her former self as Bear's spell forces her to fixate solely on her unnatural devotion to him—no matter the cost.—
Megan McCluskey,
Time,
15 May 2026
Noun
-
But anatomically speaking, this is absolute nonsense.—
Scott Travers,
Forbes.com,
15 May 2026
-
Travelers say they're done listening to the nonsense they've been fed.—
Christopher Elliott,
USA Today,
15 May 2026
Noun
-
As prospective farmers struggled to clear forests for rice fields in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Malaya, their efforts might have been accompanied by mystical incantations like this invocation against Iblis, the Devil in Islamic tradition.—
H.M.A. Leow,
JSTOR Daily,
24 Apr. 2026
-
In that loud and sultry enclosure, the aspirants lined up and repeated the same information, over and over, like an incantation to open a magic door.—
Taran Khan,
The Dial,
24 Mar. 2026
Noun
-
The film almost completely drops any and all scientific babble from the book in favor of character development, action sequences, and emotional gut punches.—
Matthew Razak,
Space.com,
23 Mar. 2026
-
Read a book and sip tea in front of the central fireplace, swim between the indoor and outdoor sections of the glimmering pool, and soak your aching quads in the hot tubs under the evergreens and aspens while listening to the peaceful babble of Gore Creek.—
Sarah Kuta,
Condé Nast Traveler,
6 Feb. 2026
Noun
-
Some of the prattle can feel like treading water, a delaying tactic until the inevitable confrontation scene.—
Theater Critic,
Los Angeles Times,
17 Apr. 2026
-
The bizarre reality of daily life in a Southeast Asian scam compound—the tactics, the tone, the mix of cruelty and upbeat corporate prattle—is revealed at an unprecedented level of resolution in a leak of documents to WIRED from a whistleblower inside one such sprawling fraud operation.—
Andy Greenberg,
Wired News,
27 Jan. 2026
Noun
-
Also, nowhere in that long letter of legal mumbo jumbo is there any mention of the 72% of the people who voted in favor of auditing the Legislature.—
Peter Lucas,
Boston Herald,
12 Feb. 2026
-
With its tongue way up its cheek, this zero-fat survival thriller is not bulked up with gratuitous sociological mumbo jumbo or layered with hidden meanings.—
Duane Byrge,
HollywoodReporter,
13 Nov. 2025
Noun
-
Some children clustered there to jabber and run madly about, while others just wanted attention and knew how to get it.—
Literary Hub,
Literary Hub,
20 Oct. 2025
-
And given that these are not professional actors, or even (in most cases) people who aspire to be, LaBeouf’s words to them, full of deadly serious jabber about empathy and ego, are pumped up with an intensity that feels overdone and inappropriate.—
Owen Gleiberman,
Variety,
19 May 2025
Noun
-
On Saturday Night Live, host Will Ferrell and musical guest Paul McCartney played a couple of gibberish-speaking mechanics who end up taking some naive car owners for a ride.—
William Vaillancourt,
Rolling Stone,
17 May 2026
-
And these worlds aren’t even real, just ones and zeros merged to form a network of communication that sometimes feels like incoherent gibberish.—
Brandon Kaipo Moningka,
Los Angeles Times,
8 Apr. 2026
Cite this Entry
“Abracadabra.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/abracadabra. Accessed 23 May. 2026.
Copy CitationLove words? Need even more definitions?
Merriam-Webster unabridged
