leak

Meaning

Noun

1. A crack, crevice, fissure, or hole which admits water or other fluid, or lets it escape.
2. The entrance or escape of a fluid through a crack, fissure, or other aperture.
3. A divulgation, or disclosure, of information previously held secret.
4. The person through whom such divulgation, or disclosure, occurs.
5. A loss of electricity through imperfect insulation, or the point where it occurs.
6. The gradual loss of a system resource caused by failure to deallocate previously reserved portions.
7. (especially, mildly, slang, vulgar) An act of urination.

Verb

1. (transitive) To allow fluid or gas to pass through an opening that should be sealed.
2. (intransitive) (of a fluid or gas) To pass through an opening that should be sealed.
3. (ambitransitive) To disclose secret information surreptitiously or anonymously.
4. (broadly, figuratively, intransitive) To pass through when it would normally or preferably be blocked.
5. (broadly, figuratively, transitive) To allow anything through that would normally or preferably be blocked.
6. (euphemistic, slang, sometimes) To urinate.
7. (US, slang) To bleed.

Adj

Leaky.

Synonyms

drip

leakage

ooze

seep

hole

🕳️

trickle

flow

escape

drop

run out

leak out

dribble

pour out

ooze out

reveal

denounce

snitch

crack

stream out

dripping

be leaky

spill

run

pour

aperture

seepage

bleed

🩸

outflow

leaking

divulge

flow out

exude

disclose

spring a leak

trickle down

gush forth

outleakage

wetting

vent

stream

sweat

😓

blurt

drain off

bleeding

🩸

drift away

leaky

flaw

fissure

gap

water

🚰

Translations

fuite

διαρροή

lecken

Leck

fuir

fuga

✈️

falla

🕳️

lek

fuga

διαρρέω

perdere

fessura

perdita

crepa

filtrar

Pronounced as (IPA)

/liːk/

Etymology

Inherited from Middle English: leken

Inherited from Old English: *lecan

Cognate with Dutch: lekken

Cognate with German: lechen

Cognate with Danish: lække

Cognate with Swedish: läcka

Cognate with Icelandic: leka

Cognate with Old English: leċċan

Cognate with Albanian: lag

In summary

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-, *leǵ- (“to leak”).
Cognate with Dutch lekken (“to leak”), German lechen, lecken (“to leak”), Danish lække (“to leak”), Swedish läcka (“to leak”), Icelandic leka (“to leak”). Related also to Old English leċċan (“to water, wet”), Albanian lag, lak (“I damp, make wet”). See also leach, lake.