Word.ws English Dictionary

Playfair

Playfair proper noun: a surname. Also the ellipsis of Playfair cipher.

Proper noun

Playfair (countable and uncountable, plural Playfairs)

  1. A surname.
  2. A placename
    1. A crater in Mars, Solar System.
    2. A crater in Moon, Earth-Moon System, Solar System.

Noun

Playfair (countable and uncountable, plural Playfairs)

  1. an encryption using the Playfair cipher
    • Here's a cipher message. Probably Playfair.1932, Dorothy Sayers, Have His Carcase
  2. (crosswording) A form of crossword in which some words must be encrypted with a Playfair cipher before being inserted into the grid, and solvers must deduce the codeword and the encrypted clues.
    • But what about Playfair puzzles ? One must reckon to solve at least three of the Playfair clues independently before cracking the code and getting checking to help with solving the fourth .1977, Games & Puzzles
    • see title2021 December 22, Azed, “No. 2,740 ‘Christmas Playfair’ - Competition Puzzle”, in The Guardian^(https://uploads.guim.co.uk/2024/12/21/AZ_2740_(22nd_December).pdf)

Also used as

Playfair is also the ellipsis of Playfair cipher.

Synonyms of Playfair

  • Playfair Crater
  • Crater Playfair

Forms of Playfair

Proper noun
pluralPlayfairs
Noun
pluralPlayfairs

Origin of Playfair

* (craters): The craters are Named after Scottish mathematician, scientist and C of S minister John Playfair * (cipher): The cipher is Named after British Lord, baron, politician and scientist Lyon Playfair, who popularized the cipher.

Words formed from Playfair

Phrases with Playfair

Questions about Playfair

What does Playfair mean?
Playfair means a surname.
What part of speech is Playfair?
Playfair can be a proper noun or a noun.

Words near Playfair in the dictionary

  1. playership
  2. playest
  3. playeth
  4. playette
  5. playettes
  6. Playfair
  7. Playfair cipher
  8. Playfair ciphers
  9. Playfair's axiom
  10. Playfair's axioms
  11. playfairite

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: Playfair (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:

Cite this entry: “Playfair.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/playfair. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.