NYT Dictionary

LEAK

/liːk/

NounVerbAdjectiveLEEKGrade 9

Accepted in official NYT Spelling Bee puzzle years: 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025, 2026

Meaning

A crack, crevice, fissure, or hole which admits water or other fluid, or lets it escape.

Etymology

Origin: Old English

From Middle English leken (“to let water in or out”), from Old English *lecan (“to leak”), Middle Dutch leken (“to leak, drip”) or Old Norse leka (“to leak, drip”); all from Proto-Germanic *lekaną (“to leak, drain”), from Proto-Indo-European *leg- (“to leak”). Cognate with Dutch lekken (“to leak”), German lechen, lecken (“to leak”), Danish lække (“to leak”), Swedish läcka (“to leak”), Norwegian Bokmål lekke (“to leak”), Faroese, Icelandic, and Norwegian Nynorsk leka (“to leak”). Related also to Old English leċċan (“to water, wet”), Albanian lag, lak (“to damp, make wet”). See also leach, lake. (divulgation, disclosure of information): Compare typologically Bulgarian изтичане (iztičane), Polish przeciek, Russian уте́чка (utéčka) (akin to течь impf or f (tečʹ)).

Synonyms & Antonyms

Synonyms

break the sealhit the headmicturatepass waterpeepiddlepissslashtake a leaktake a piss

NYT Puzzle Appearances

Accepted in 13 recorded puzzles:

+1 earlier appearances in the archive.