Other forms: misreading, misreads
To misread is to read or understand something wrongly. Misread the sign, misread the situation, badly misread.
The literal sense is about text and the figurative one about people and situations — misreading the mood is a far more consequential mistake than misreading a word. It is used constantly in political and business post-mortems: they misread the public. Note that the past tense is also misread but pronounced differently, which is a small trap in reading aloud.
1verbmisreadTo read or understand something wrongly.
“I misread the timetable and arrived at the station an hour late.”
2verbjudgeTo judge a situation wrongly.
“He misread the situation and told a joke at a funeral.”
misread is a misunderstanding.
Old English misraedan meant to advise wrongly as well as to read wrongly. German missraten and Dutch misraden are the same compound doing related work.
Old English
misrǣdan — to advise wrongly; read wrongly
Middle English
misreden
English, today
misread
From Middle English misreden, from Old English misrǣdan (“to advise wrongly; read wrongly”), equivalent to mis- + read. Cognate with stq misräide (“to go wrong, fail”), Dutch misraden (“to guess wrongly”), German missraten (“to fail; go wrong; become wayward”). For the noun, compare Old English misrǣd (“misguidance; misconduct”).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA