leek
/liːk/noun
leek is spelled L-E-E-K: 4 letters and one syllable. It appears about once in every 1 million words in written English, the 34,063rd most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). People search “leak vs leek” about 210 times a month (Google, United States). As a noun, leek means “A vegetable of variety Allium ampeloprasum, having edible leaves and an onion-like bulb but with a milder flavour than the onion” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of leek is leeks.
How many letters and syllables are in leek?
| Letters | 4: L-E-E-K |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 1 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | about once in every 1 million words; the 34,063rd most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | none measured in search |
| Pairs people search | |
| Sounds like | |
| Same letters |
Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation and the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary; written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media); Bing searches in the United States: the average month from September 2025 to August 2026 (Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, read September 30, 2026); rhymes and same-letter words are computed by PlainSpell from its own word list.
How common is leek?
Leek appears about once in every 1 million words in written English, the 34,063rd most frequent word form in the list.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
How do you pronounce leek?
- /liːk/
Leek has one syllable (counted from its American pronunciation in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: En-us-leak.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Words people confuse with leek
Word pairs people search, with the monthly searches for “a vs b” (G: Google, B: Bing, United States).
Sounds like: leak (Wiktionary's homophone list; some hold only in some accents).
Sources: Google and Bing searches (September 2025 to August 2026, through DataForSEO); English Wiktionary (homophones, alternative spellings).
What rhymes with leek?
No other word on PlainSpell ends in the same sounds as leek.
Spelled with the same letters in another order: keel, elke.
Computed by PlainSpell from the pronunciations in the English Wiktionary (dump of September 2, 2026): a rhyme shares every sound from the last stressed vowel to the end; ordered by written frequency (wordfreq 3.1).
Forms of leek
- leeks plural
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does leek mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
noun
- 1
A vegetable of variety Allium ampeloprasum, having edible leaves and an onion-like bulb but with a milder flavour than the onion.
- 2
Any of several species of Allium, broadly resembling the domesticated plant in appearance in the wild.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Leek in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense vegetable:
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | poireau, porrée, porreau, poirée, poirette, asperge du pauvre |
| German | Porree, Lauch, Breitlauch, Winterlauch |
| Portuguese | porro, alho-porro, alho-poró, alho-francês |
| Spanish | puerro, porro, poro |
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.
Where does leek come from?
From Middle English leek, leeke, lek, leke, leyke, from Old English lēac, lēc (“allium; garlic or leek”), from Proto-West Germanic *lauk, from Proto-Germanic *laukaz (“leek”), from *leukaną, *lūkaną (“to close, shut”), from Proto-Indo-European *lewg- (“to bend”).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).