Meaning

(transitive) To overwhelm with bewilderment; to amaze, confound, or stun, especially in a ludicrous manner..

Definitions by Sense

1. (transitive) To overwhelm with bewilderment; to amaze, confound, or stun, especially in a ludicrous manner.
2. (countable) An awkward person.
3. (uncountable) Overwhelming confusion, shock, or surprise.

Example Sentences

He was flabbergasted to find that his work had been done for him before he began.

Her stupidity flabbergasts me, and I have to force myself to keep a straight face while she explains her beliefs.

The oddity of the situation was so flabbergasting I couldn’t react in time for anyone to see it.

Now we are flabbergaſted and bored from morning to night—in the ſenate, at Cox's muſeum, at Ranelagh, and even at church.

They flabagast good manners and good morals, and only show that one of the parties is vex'd and disappinted.^([sic])

Now, there are assertions, not dissimilar in their power of benumbing and flabbergasting one, but yet within the bounds of sane and perfectly orderly plausibility, for which our language wants a name. Paradox is too hackneyed a term. They ought to be called Buckleisms. When a man makes an assertion clean in the teeth of all previous belief, and makes it coolly, fluently, without proof, and yet as if contradiction were impossible—that is a Buckleism.

Skates that are not quite a fit, my dear Smith, / May flabberghast even a chap of your pith.

At this I was rendered completely flabaghast—for, although the allegation was undeniably correct, I had confidently hoped that my friend Ram was unaware of the fact, or would at least have the ordinary mother-wit to refrain from blurting it out!

Word Forms

• flabbergasts
• flabbergasting
• flabbergasted
• flabbergast

Synonyms for flabbergast

Related Words

When Should You Use Flabbergast?

Use flabbergast when its meaning, tone and grammar fit the full sentence. A synonym is not always a direct replacement.

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