Click Meaning
/klɪk/Definition, CEFR level B1, pronunciation, examples, and quiz.
Listen pronunciation
Definition
nounA brief, sharp, not particularly loud, relatively high-pitched sound produced by the impact of something small and hard against something hard, such as by the operation of a switch, a lock, or a latch.
nounThe act of snapping one's fingers.
Sentence Examples
Click: Quickly pushing the mouse's left hand side button once.
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CEFR Practice Quiz
I heard the ____ of the lock as it closed.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
You need to ____ on the red button to submit your application.
Word Origin & History
Imitative of the "click" sound; first recorded in the 1500s. Compare Saterland Frisian klikke (“to click”), Middle Dutch clicken (Modern Dutch: klikken (“to click”)), Old High German klecchen (Modern German: klecken, klicken (“to click”)), Danish klikke (“to click”), Swedish klicka (“to click”), Norwegian klikke (“to click”), Norwegian klekke (“to hatch”).
Literary Quotations & Historical Citations
"There was a click in the front sitting-room. Mr. Pearce had extinguished the lamp."
— 1922 October 26, Virginia Woolf, chapter 1, in Jacob’s Room, Richmond, London: […] Leonard & Virginia Woolf at the Hogarth Press, →OCLC; republished London: The Hogarth Press, 1960, →OCLC:
"The dirty secret of the internet is that all this distraction and interruption is immensely profitable. Web companies like to boast about[…]and so on. But the real way to build a successful online business is to be better than your rivals at undermining people's control of their own attention. Partly, this is a result of how online advertising has traditionally worked: advertisers pay for clicks, and a click is a click, however it's obtained."
— 2013 June 21, Oliver Burkeman, “The tao of tech”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 189, number 2, page 48:
"Internet traffic to legal pornography sites in the UK comprised 8.5% of all "clicks" on web pages in June – exceeding those for shopping, news, business or social networks, according to new data obtained exclusively by the Guardian."
— 2013 July 26, Charles Arthur, “Porn sites get more internet traffic in UK than social networks or shopping”, in The Guardian, →ISSN:
"A wheel, with teeth in which a click or pawl engages to prevent backward motion; or the same with addition of another click through which power is imparted at intervals to move the wheel."
— 1943, Chilton's Jewelers' Circular:
"This roused the tinker's choler, already provoked at Tugwell's amorous freedom with his doxy, and he gave him a click in the mazard. Tugwell had not been used tamely to receive a kick or a cuff; he, therefore, gave the tinker a rejoinder, […]"
— 1808, Richard Graves, The Spiritual Quixote, page 127:
Explore More B1 Vocabulary Words
CEFR Practice Quiz
I heard the ____ of the lock as it closed.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
You need to ____ on the red button to submit your application.