1. Mischievous imaginary creatures blamed for causing unexplained mechanical or technical failures.
Usage: Usually plural; often used humorously or informally
2. Unforeseen problems or malfunctions in a system, device, or plan.
Usage: Informal; used metaphorically

Examples

• The airplane kept breaking down, and the mechanic joked that gremlins were responsible.
• We blamed the gremlins when our computer crashed during the presentation.
• There must be gremlins in the system—nothing is working properly today.
• The software engineers spent hours hunting for gremlins in the code.
• Every time we try to launch the project, gremlins seem to get in the way.
• The old car had so many gremlins that we finally decided to replace it.