unleserlich

Unleserlich is a German adjective meaning unreadable or illegible. It is used to describe text or handwriting that cannot be read with certainty, due to poor penmanship, damaged print, or obfuscated typography.

The word is formed with the un- prefix and lesen “to read.” The root lesen derives from Old High German and is related to the English word “read.”

In everyday language, unleserlich describes handwriting; in official contexts, forms may note “unleserlich” if handwriting is illegible. Medical notes, labels, and archival descriptions sometimes include the term when text cannot be read. The term can also appear in discussions of documents or inscriptions that are partially damaged or faded.

In technology and data processing, “unleserlich” can refer to text or symbols that OCR (optical character recognition) or digital rendering cannot decipher due to noise, unusual fonts, or corrupted data. In such contexts, the term helps categorize content that requires manual transcription or restoration.

Related terms include lesbar or leserlich, which describe legible text, and the English equivalent “readable.” The word can also appear in compound forms such as unleserliche Handschrift (unreadable handwriting).