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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

yea.

Yes, indeed.

3 characters1 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

adv/jeɪ//jiː/obsolete/jiː/Early, Modern/jɛː/Early, Modern
  1. Yes, indeed.

    dated · not-comparable
  2. Thus, so (now often accompanied by a hand gesture by way of measurement).

    Midwestern-US · dated · not-comparable
Where this word comes from

From Middle English ye, ȝea, ya, ȝa, from Old English ġēa, iā (“yea, yes”), from Proto-West Germanic *jā. The modern pronunciation shows an irregular development of Early Modern English /ɛː/ to /eɪ/ in the standard language, probably from association with the antonym nay.

conj/jeɪ//jiː/obsolete/jiː/Early, Modern/jɛː/Early, Modern
  1. Or even, or more like, nay. Introduces a stronger and more appropriate expression than the preceding one.

    archaic · dated
Where this word comes from

From Middle English ye, ȝea, ya, ȝa, from Old English ġēa, iā (“yea, yes”), from Proto-West Germanic *jā. The modern pronunciation shows an irregular development of Early Modern English /ɛː/ to /eɪ/ in the standard language, probably from association with the antonym nay.

intj/jeɪ//jiː/obsolete/jiː/Early, Modern/jɛː/Early, Modern
  1. Yeah, right, yes.

    Southern-US · US · Western · dated
Where this word comes from

From Middle English ye, ȝea, ya, ȝa, from Old English ġēa, iā (“yea, yes”), from Proto-West Germanic *jā. The modern pronunciation shows an irregular development of Early Modern English /ɛː/ to /eɪ/ in the standard language, probably from association with the antonym nay.

noun/jeɪ//jiː/obsolete/jiː/Early, Modern/jɛː/Early, Modern
  1. An affirmative vote, usually but not always spoken

    dated
Where this word comes from

From Middle English ye, ȝea, ya, ȝa, from Old English ġēa, iā (“yea, yes”), from Proto-West Germanic *jā. The modern pronunciation shows an irregular development of Early Modern English /ɛː/ to /eɪ/ in the standard language, probably from association with the antonym nay.

intj/ˈjɛ(ə)//ˈjæ(ə)/
  1. Alternative spelling of yeah.

    alt-of · alternative · dated · nonstandard · proscribed
Where this word comes from

From yeah.

intj/jeɪ/
  1. Misspelling of yay.

    alt-of · dated · misspelling
Where this word comes from

See yay.

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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.