fragmented

adjective

frag·​ment·​ed ˈfrag-ˌmen-təd 

1

: broken or separated into distinct parts

Another fragmented language group is the Austroasiatic family, whose most widely spoken languages are Vietnamese and Cambodian.

—Jared Diamond

The reality seems to be that the global audience for movies has become increasingly diverse and fragmented, which runs against Hollywood's obsession with finding that magic common denominator.

—Peter Bart

2

computing : having related or associated pieces of stored data disorganized in a way that makes them more difficult to access

Fragmented files require much more work to read than contiguous files, because to do so DOS must chase down each sector, possibly moving the disk head back and forth many times. Each of these … slows the task at hand and results in additional wear and tear on your hard disk.

—Brett Glass

You probably won't notice a marked performance boost unless your hard drive is extremely fragmented.

—Doug Stanley

Synonyms

• broken
• busted
• fractured
• shattered
• smashed

Examples of fragmented in a Sentence

restoring the fragmented Roman sculpture was like putting together a jigsaw puzzle

Recent Examples on the Web

The severance procedure—by erasing personal memories during work hours—creates a fragmented sense of self that leads to emotional dissonance. —Benjamin Laker, Forbes, 21 Mar. 2025

So the true question here is whether America aspires to be a strong, unified country or merely a fragmented confederation that doesn't stand for anything in particular and will cease to inspire the world. —David Faris, Newsweek, 17 Mar. 2025

Yet commitment to funding repairs, replacement, and upgrades tends to be discussed in fragmented and disconnected ways as if failing to maintain the system would have no impact on our region’s communities, jobs, economy, or environment. —Chris Jones, New York Daily News, 10 Mar. 2025

With media becoming more fragmented and distrusted even as (or because) there’s more of it than ever, this felt like a good moment to catch up with Stevens. —Steven Zeitchik, The Hollywood Reporter, 10 Mar. 2025

Word History

First Known Use

circa 1817, in the meaning defined at sense 1