Peek

How to spell peek

4 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce peek

What does peek mean?

1. verbTo look quickly or secretly, often through a small or partly hidden opening.
2. nounA quick or secretive look at something.

Peek in a sentence

• verb

  The children tried to peek at the wrapped presents under the tree.

• noun

  She took a quick peek at her phone during the meeting.

• verb

  She lifted the lid to peek at the cake baking in the oven.

• noun

  One peek inside the box confirmed the order was correct.

Where does peek come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

Peek comes from the Middle English verb piken or peken, which meant 'to glance quickly' or 'to peer', and which appeared in English around the 1400s. Its earlier origins are genuinely uncertain, though it is thought to be related to a small family of words for furtive looking, including 'peep' and 'peer', that share a soft, quick quality of sound. Throughout its history the word has always carried the sense of a brief, sometimes secretive look rather than a long, steady gaze. The noun sense, 'a quick look', grew naturally out of the verb and became common by the 1600s. The spelling trap is that peek sounds identical to 'peak' (a mountain top or highest point) and 'pique' (to irritate or to stir interest), so the doubled 'ee', which you can link to the two 'ee's in 'see' and 'eyes', helps fix that this is the looking word.

How the word is built

• peek (single root; from Middle English piken meaning 'to glance')

Words that sound like peek

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

• peak: The highest point of something, such as a mountain summit or a maximum level.