at sixes and sevens
Proposed by a contributor, not yet supported by evidence.
Meaning · English
Completely disorganized or confused
Literally: at six and seven, implying chaos
Where it’s used:
Used
Widespread English
Examples
In short, as the 1950s came to a close, Western Europe was truly and literally at sixes and sevens.
It puts me all at sixes and sevens.’
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 “at sixes and sevens” mean?
Completely disorganized or confused Literally: at six and seven, implying chaos
Is “at sixes and sevens” formal or informal?
No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.