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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

liao.

Indicates action completion, or more generally, perfective aspect.

4 characters1 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

particle[ljaʊ˨˩]Singapore[ljaʊ˨]Singapore, interrogative[ljaʊ˦˨]Singapore
  1. Indicates action completion, or more generally, perfective aspect.

    Manglish · Singlish
    I run 4 laps liao.
    You decorate the cake liao?
  2. Marks a change in state, more or less in the same manner as the inchoative aspect (see usage notes).

    Manglish · Singlish
    It’s going to rain liao.
    Reach liao, give me a call.
  3. Marks a change in state, more or less in the same manner as the inchoative aspect (see usage notes). Used to emphasize that something has to be done now.

    Manglish · Singlish
    Go liao!
Where this word comes from

Borrowed from Hokkien 了 (liáu) and Teochew 了 (liao²), with tone and spelling influenced by Mandarin 了 (liǎo) and its romanization in Hanyu Pinyin.

noun[ljaʊ˦˨]Singapore
  1. Meats, vegetables, and other ingredients added to an otherwise plain dish.

    Singapore · colloquial · uncountable
Where this word comes from

From Mandarin 料 (liào, “ingredients”).

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liao studioliao workshello, liao

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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.