Packed

How to spell packed

6 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce packed

What does packed mean?

1. verbPut things into a container, case, or bundle, especially in preparation for travel or storage.
2. adjectiveFilled to capacity; crowded or tightly full.

Packed in a sentence

• verb

  She packed her suitcase the night before the early flight.

• adjective

  The commuter train was completely packed during rush hour.

• verb

  He packed the fragile glasses in bubble wrap before the move.

• adjective

  The stadium was packed for the final match of the season.

Where does packed come from?

Language of origin: Dutch

The base word 'pack' arrived in English around the 1200s from the trading languages of the Low Countries, Middle Dutch and Middle Low German, where 'pak' meant a bundle of goods tied up for transport. Wool merchants and other traders used it for the standardised bundles they shipped across the North Sea, and English took the word straight into the language of commerce. The verb 'to pack', meaning to gather things into a container or bundle, followed naturally, and its regular past form 'packed' has been in use for centuries. From the literal idea of cramming goods tightly into a bale came the figurative adjective sense of any space being 'packed', that is crowded or filled to capacity. A key spelling point is that the word ends in the sound of 't' but is written with 'ed', which is exactly why it is so easily confused in writing with its homophone 'pact', an entirely unrelated word meaning an agreement.

How the word is built

• pack (to put into a container, from Middle Dutch/Middle Low German pak: bundle)
• -ed (past tense / past participle suffix)

Words that sound like packed

They sound the same but mean different things, so the meaning decides which spelling to write.

• pact: A formal agreement or treaty between two or more parties.