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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

leaf.

The usually green and flat organ that represents the most prominent feature of most vegetative plants.

4 characters1 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/liːf/Received-Pronunciation/lif/US
  1. The usually green and flat organ that represents the most prominent feature of most vegetative plants.

    countable · uncountable
  2. A foliage leaf or any of the many and often considerably different structures it can specialise into.

    countable · uncountable
  3. Anything resembling the leaf of a plant.

    countable · uncountable
  4. A sheet of a book, magazine, etc. (consisting of two pages, one on each face of the leaf).

    countable · uncountable
  5. A sheet of any substance beaten or rolled until very thin.

    countable · uncountable
    gold leaf
  6. One of the individual flat or curved strips of metal, typically made of spring steel, that make up a leaf spring.

    countable · uncountable
  7. Tea leaves.

    countable · in-plural · uncountable
  8. A flat section used to extend the size of a table.

    countable · uncountable
  9. A moveable panel, e.g. of a bridge or door, originally one that hinged but now also applied to other forms of movement.

    countable · uncountable
    The train car has one single-leaf and two double-leaf doors per side.
  10. In a tree, a node that has no descendants.

    countable · uncountable
  11. The layer of fat supporting the kidneys of a pig, leaf fat.

    countable · uncountable
  12. One of the teeth of a pinion, especially when small.

    countable · uncountable
  13. Cannabis.

    slang · uncountable
  14. A Canadian person.

    Internet · countable · humorous · pejorative · sometimes · uncountable
  15. A particular value of the EAX register when a program runs the CPUID instruction; each leaf represents a different category of information returned about the processor.

    countable · uncountable
Where this word comes from

Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *lewbʰ-der.? Proto-Germanic *laubą Proto-West Germanic *laub Old English lēaf Middle English lef English leaf From Middle English lef, leef, from Old English lēaf, from Proto-West Germanic *laub, from Proto-Germanic *laubą (“leaf”), from Proto-Indo-European *lowbʰ-o-m, from *lewbʰ- (“to cut off”). Cognates Cognate with Scots leaf (“leaf”), Yola laafe (“leaf”), North Frisian luuf (“leaf”), Saterland Frisian Loof (“leaf”), West Frisian leaf (“leaf”), Cimbrian loap (“leaf”), Dutch loof (“foliage”), German Laub (“leaves”), German Low German Loov (“leaf”), Luxembourgish Laf (“foliage, leaves”), Mòcheno lap (“leaf”), Vilamovian łaub, łaup, łojp (“leaf”), Danish and Norwegian Bokmål løv (“leaf”), Faroese leyv (“leaf”), Icelandic lauf (“leaf”), Norwegian Nynorsk lauv (“leaf”), Swedish löv (“leaf”), Gothic 𐌻𐌰𐌿𐍆𐍃 (laufs, “leaf”); also Irish luibh (“herb, plant”), Latin liber (“bast; book”), Albanian labë (“rind”), Lithuanian lúobas (“bark; bast”), Polish łub (“bark”), Russian луб (lub, “bast”). (Internet slang: Canadian): In reference to the maple leaf as national symbol.

verb/liːf/Received-Pronunciation/lif/US
  1. To produce leaves; put forth foliage.

    intransitive
  2. To divide (a vegetable) into separate leaves.

    transitive
    The lettuce in our burgers is 100% hand-leafed.
  3. To play a prank on someone by throwing a large clump or collection of leaves at them.

    informal · transitive · uncommon
Where this word comes from

Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *lewbʰ-der.? Proto-Germanic *laubą Proto-West Germanic *laub Old English lēaf Middle English lef English leaf From Middle English lef, leef, from Old English lēaf, from Proto-West Germanic *laub, from Proto-Germanic *laubą (“leaf”), from Proto-Indo-European *lowbʰ-o-m, from *lewbʰ- (“to cut off”). Cognates Cognate with Scots leaf (“leaf”), Yola laafe (“leaf”), North Frisian luuf (“leaf”), Saterland Frisian Loof (“leaf”), West Frisian leaf (“leaf”), Cimbrian loap (“leaf”), Dutch loof (“foliage”), German Laub (“leaves”), German Low German Loov (“leaf”), Luxembourgish Laf (“foliage, leaves”), Mòcheno lap (“leaf”), Vilamovian łaub, łaup, łojp (“leaf”), Danish and Norwegian Bokmål løv (“leaf”), Faroese leyv (“leaf”), Icelandic lauf (“leaf”), Norwegian Nynorsk lauv (“leaf”), Swedish löv (“leaf”), Gothic 𐌻𐌰𐌿𐍆𐍃 (laufs, “leaf”); also Irish luibh (“herb, plant”), Latin liber (“bast; book”), Albanian labë (“rind”), Lithuanian lúobas (“bark; bast”), Polish łub (“bark”), Russian луб (lub, “bast”). (Internet slang: Canadian): In reference to the maple leaf as national symbol.

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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.