puzzling

[ puhz-ling ]

adjective

1. confusing or baffling:

   a puzzling answer.

noun

1. the skill or pastime of constructing or working crossword or other puzzles.

Other Words From

• puzzling·ly adverb

Word History and Origins

Origin of puzzling¹

First recorded in 1590–1600; puzzle + -ing ²

Example Sentences

Among the many complicated aspects of Covid-19, long Covid is one of the most puzzling.

From Quartz

That such a similar group of players could appear so different after a world championship — albeit two years later, with the pandemic-disrupted schedule — is puzzling.

From FiveThirtyEight

Welcome to Ask a Gear Editor, our monthly column where we answer readers’ most puzzling gear questions.

From Outside Online

Even more puzzling, the team also found a collection of some 6,000 stone tools at the Nesher Ramla site.

From Singularity Hub 

Which seems puzzling, given that hard seltzers’ initial appeal to younger drinkers was its party-all-day alcohol levels and related lower calorie counts.

From Washington Post

The name of Barabbas is worth looking at closely, as it makes the story more challenging as well puzzling.

From The Daily Beast

The choice of targets for U.S. warplanes is increasingly puzzling.

From The Daily Beast

Whether the lack of liberal involvement in the museum is the result of commission or omission, it is puzzling.

From The Daily Beast

First, it is puzzling that Facebook ever finds itself in a privacy fight at all.

From The Daily Beast

With midterm elections on the horizon, the timing is particularly puzzling.

From The Daily Beast

This new appreciation of his character clarifies various incidents heretofore puzzling to me.

From Project Gutenberg

He therefore put a variety of puzzling questions, and took down a good many notes.

From Project Gutenberg

Writing in dialect makes many of his stories puzzling, if not impossible for foreign readers.

From Project Gutenberg

Meantime, Joe had been puzzling his wits and wishing his wife was there to devise some plan for the wayfarer.

From Project Gutenberg

A rather pleasing, yet puzzling, deception is to pass a dollar bill into the interior of an examined lemon or apple.

From Project Gutenberg

Related Words

• ambiguous
• baffling
• bewildering
• difficult
• incomprehensible
• inexplicable
• mystifying
• obscure
• perplexing
• surprising
• unclear
• unfathomable