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PlainSpell

enmesh

/ɛnˈmɛʃ/verb

enmesh is a verb meaning “To mesh; to tangle or interweave in such a manner as not to be easily separated, particularly in a mesh- or net-like manner” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled E-N-M-E-S-H and has 2 syllables, and it appears about once in every 54 million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data).

What does enmesh mean?

verb

  1. 1

    To mesh; to tangle or interweave in such a manner as not to be easily separated, particularly in a mesh- or net-like manner.

  2. 2

    To involve in such complications as to render extrication difficult.

  3. 3

    To involve in difficulties.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

How do you pronounce enmesh?

  • /ɛnˈmɛʃ/

Enmesh has 2 syllables (counted from its American pronunciation in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary).

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: LL-Q1860_(eng)-Vealhurl-enmesh.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

Forms of enmesh

  • enmeshes present, singular, he/she/it
  • enmeshing participle, present
  • enmeshed participle, past

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

How common is enmesh?

Enmesh appears about once in every 54 million words in written English, the 228,409th most frequent word form in the list.

Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).

Enmesh in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

LanguageWords
Frenchpiéger, captiver (To mesh; to tangle or interweave), emberlificoter, empêtrer, entortiller (To involve in such complications)
Spanishenredar (To mesh; to tangle or interweave), enmarañar (To involve in such complications)

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.

Where does enmesh come from?

From en- + mesh.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).