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Tetris.

A puzzle video game in which falling tetrominoes must be manipulated to form complete lines, which are then cleared from the grid.

6 characters2 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

name/ˈtɛtɹɪs/UK, US
  1. A puzzle video game in which falling tetrominoes must be manipulated to form complete lines, which are then cleared from the grid.

  2. An endeavor involving rearranging things of different shape into a physical space.

    figuratively
Where this word comes from

From Russian Те́трис (Tétris), coined by the creator of the game, Alexey Pajitnov, from the Russian numerical prefix тетра- (tetra-, “tetra-”) (as all of the game's pieces contain four segments) and те́ннис (ténnis, “tennis”), his favourite sport.

noun/ˈtɛtɹɪs/UK, US
  1. The act of clearing four lines at once (the maximum possible) in Tetris.

    broadly
Where this word comes from

From Russian Те́трис (Tétris), coined by the creator of the game, Alexey Pajitnov, from the Russian numerical prefix тетра- (tetra-, “tetra-”) (as all of the game's pieces contain four segments) and те́ннис (ténnis, “tennis”), his favourite sport.

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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.