munge
/mʌnd͡ʒ/verb
munge is spelled M-U-N-G-E: 5 letters. It appears about once in every 91 million words in written English, the 305,310th most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As a verb, munge means “To transform data in an undefined or unexplained manner, as for example when data wrangling requires nonsystemic or nonsystematic edits” (English Wiktionary, September 2026).
How many letters and syllables are in munge?
| Letters | 5: M-U-N-G-E |
|---|---|
| In writing | about once in every 91 million words; the 305,310th most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | none measured in search |
Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation; written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
How common is munge?
Munge appears about once in every 91 million words in written English, the 305,310th 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).
How do you pronounce munge?
- /mʌnd͡ʒ/
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: LL-Q1860_(eng)-Vealhurl-munge.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Forms of munge
- munges present, singular, he/she/it
- munging participle, present
- munged participle, past
- mung
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does munge mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
verb
- 1
informalTo transform data in an undefined or unexplained manner, as for example when data wrangling requires nonsystemic or nonsystematic edits.
- 2
informalTo add a spamblock to (an email address).
- 3
informalTo corrupt a record about a person by erroneously merging in information about another person.
It looks like this record is munged–it has this person’s birth date, but his father’s death date.
- 4
Alternative form of mounge.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Munge in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense transform data in an undefined/unexplained manner:
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| German | beschädigen, zerstören |
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 munge come from?
Variant of mung; likely a misconstructed back-formation from munging, munged or munger.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).