- [countable] a device for raising heavy objects off the ground, especially vehicles so that a wheel can be changedTopics Transport by car or lorryc2
Definitions on the go
Look up any word in the dictionary offline, anytime, anywhere with the Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary app.
- [countable] an electronic connection between two pieces of electrical equipmentTopics Engineeringc2
- [countable] (in a pack of cards) a card with a picture of a young man on it, normally worth more than a ten and less than a queen
- the jack of clubs
- [countable] (in the game of bowls) a small white ball towards which players roll larger balls
- jacks[plural] a children’s game in which players bounce a small ball and pick up small metal objects, also called jacks, before catching the ballTopics Games and toysc2
- (also jack shit taboo)[uncountable] (North American English, slang) (usually used in negative sentences) anything or nothing at all
- You don't know jack.
see also blackjack, flapjack, jumping jack, Union Jack
Word Originlate Middle English: from Jack, familiar form of the given name John. The term was used originally to denote an ordinary man, also a youth (mid 16th cent.), hence the ‘knave’ in cards and ‘male animal’. The word also denoted various devices saving human labour, as though one had a helper (sense (1), and in compounds such as jackhammer and jackknife); the general sense ‘labourer’ arose in the early 18th cent. and survives in lumberjack, steeplejack, etc. Since the mid 16th cent. a notion of ‘smallness’ has arisen, hence senses (4) and (5).
Idioms
See jack in the Oxford Advanced American Dictionaryall work and no play (makes Jack a dull boy)
- (saying) it is not healthy to spend all your time working; you need to relax too
I’m all right, Jack
- (British English, informal) used by or about somebody who is happy with their own life and does not care about other people’s problems
a jack of all trades
- a person who can do many different types of work, but who perhaps does not do them very well
Check pronunciation:
jack