banjax
UK/ˈbæn.d͡ʒæks/
banjax verb: to ruin or destroy.
Verb
banjax (third-person singular simple present banjaxes, present participle banjaxing, simple past and past participle banjaxed)
- To ruin or destroy.
- I hoofed his backside till he went down all of a heap. That banjaxed his little game. You should have heard his hullabulloo.1922, Darrell Figgis, The House of Success, The Gael Co-operative Publishing Society, Ltd., page 146
- Indeed, it seemed that the army was hopelessly banjaxed.1928, Eimar O'Duffy, The Spacious Adventures of the Man in the Street, Macmillan, page 370
Noun
banjax (plural banjaxes)
- A mess or undesirable situation made as a result of incompetence.
- I'm tellin' you the scholar, Bentham, made a banjax o' th' Will.1922, Seán O'Casey, Juno and the Paycock
Examples of banjax in a sentence
- For quotations using this term, see Citations:banjax.
- Emma had suggested that you hide, said your presence might banjax her position.1970, Edna O'Brien, A Pagan Place, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, published 2001, page 91:
- Fraser was looking at the flat, wet countryside and thinking about the French policeman who had banjaxed him with the truncheon.2006, Craig Ferguson, Between the Bridge and the River, Chronicle Books, page 252:
Forms of banjax
| Verb | |
|---|---|
| third-person singular present | banjaxes |
| present participle | banjaxing |
| past participle | banjaxed |
| past | banjaxed |
| alternative form | banjack |
| alternative form | bandjax |
| Noun | |
| plural | banjaxes |
Origin of banjax
Unknown, perhaps originally Dublin slang. According to Green’s Dictionary of Slang, may be a euphemism for bollocks.
Words that rhyme with banjax
Questions about banjax
- What does banjax mean?
- Banjax means to ruin or destroy.
- How do you use banjax in a sentence?
- For quotations using this term, see Citations:banjax.
- What part of speech is banjax?
- Banjax can be a verb or a noun.
- How do you pronounce banjax?
- Banjax is pronounced /ˈbæn.d͡ʒæks/ (UK).
- What is the past tense of banjax?
- The past tense of banjax is banjaxed.
Words near banjax in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: banjax (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
Last updated:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-banjax.ogg.
Cite this entry: “banjax.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/banjax. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.