To misremember means to remember something incorrectly or incompletely. When you misremember a fact, a story, or an event, your memory has changed or mixed up the details without you realizing it.

You might misremember which friend told you a particular joke, or misremember the color of your kindergarten classroom walls, or misremember the exact words your coach used during halftime. Your brain isn't lying to you: it genuinely believes the incorrect version is true. Memory works more like retelling a story than playing back a video recording, and each time we recall something, small details can shift.

People often misremember the details of childhood events, blending together different birthdays or field trips into a single memory. You might misremember a book's ending after a few years, or misremember what you ate for lunch last Tuesday. Sometimes groups of people misremember the same thing, like thinking a company's logo looked different from what it actually was.

Misremembering is completely normal and happens to everyone. It's different from deliberately lying, since when you misremember something, you truly believe your faulty memory is correct. Scientists who study memory have shown that every time we recall something, we're actually reconstructing it, which means small errors can creep in without us noticing.