Click

How to spell click

5 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce click

What does click mean?

1. verbTo press and release a button on a computer mouse or other control device.
2. verbTo make a short, sharp sound, or to cause something to make one.
3. nounA short, sharp sound, like that of a switch or a latch.

Click in a sentence

• verb

  To open the file, click the icon on your desktop.

• verb

  The latch will click when the door is properly shut.

• noun

  A faint click told her the recorder had started.

• verb

  You can click the link to confirm your booking.

• verb

  Her heels click against the polished tiles.

• noun

  The lock turned with a satisfying click.

Where does click come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

Click is an imitative, or onomatopoeic, word: it was coined to mimic the short, sharp sound it names, much as 'clack', 'clink' and 'cluck' were. It appears in English from the late 1500s, and it has close cousins in other Germanic languages, including the Dutch verb 'klikken', which also imitates a sudden snapping noise, and the French 'cliquer', meaning to make a small clicking sound. For centuries it described latches, locks, heels and tongues, but in the late twentieth century it gained a wholly new life in computing, naming the act of pressing a mouse button because of the faint sound the button makes. Because the spelling simply doubles up the crisp consonants, with the 'ck' ending that English regularly uses after a short vowel, it has stayed phonetically transparent and is rarely misspelt.

How the word is built

• click (imitative root mimicking a short, sharp sound)