all over the map
Proposed by a contributor, not yet supported by evidence.
Meaning · English
Completely disorganized or inconsistent
Literally: scattered across a map
Where it’s used:
Used
Widespread English
Examples
But the answers have been all over the map, with some finding that the yuan is not undervalued at ~ all, while others argue that it should appreciate against the dollar by more than 30%.
The very term ' course ' implies a definite path of study; the student is not going to go wandering all over the intellectual map.
British National Corpus sentence via the MAGPIE corpus (CC BY 4.0, retrieved 2026-07-30)
Sources & notes
Listed in Wiktionary’s “English idioms” category (retrieved 2026-07-29); definition pending editorial review. Definition drafted by AI (@cf/meta/llama-3.3-70b-instruct-fp8-fast) and auto-approved by rule on 2026-07-30; pending editor spot-check.
Common questions
What does “all over the map” mean?
Completely disorganized or inconsistent Literally: scattered across a map
Is “all over the map” formal or informal?
No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.