Meaning & use

confidential

adjective·Academic

Meant to be kept secret or private, and shared only with people who are authorized to know it.

See it in a sentence

The lawyer reminded her client that everything discussed in the meeting was strictly confidential.

Employee salaries are treated as confidential information within the company.

A note on using this word

Confidential is common in professional and legal contexts; 'private' is the more everyday equivalent for personal matters.

Words with a similar meaning

privateclassifiedsecret

Choose a synonym to suit the sentence. Meanings can overlap without being identical.

Words with an opposite meaning

Make it your own

Write a sentence using “confidential”, then compare your use with the examples above.

Your draft stays on this page and is not sent anywhere.