lunch
/lʌnt͡ʃ/noun, verb
lunch is spelled L-U-N-C-H: 5 letters and one syllable. It appears 46 times per million words in written English, the 2,204th most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As a noun, lunch means “A light meal usually eaten around midday, notably when not as main meal of the day” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of lunch is lunches.
How many letters and syllables are in lunch?
| Letters | 5: L-U-N-C-H |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 1 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | 46 times per million words; the 2,204th most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | none measured in search |
| Rhymes with |
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); rhymes and same-letter words are computed by PlainSpell from its own word list.
How common is lunch?
Lunch appears 46 times per million words in written English, the 2,204th 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 lunch?
- US /lʌnt͡ʃ/
- US /lʌnʃ/
- US [lʌ̃nt͡ʃ]
Lunch 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-uk-lunch.ogg, En-us-lunch.ogg, En-au-lunch.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
What rhymes with lunch?
2 words on PlainSpell end in the same sounds as lunch from its last stressed vowel (/ʌntʃ/):
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 lunch
- lunches plural, present, singular, he/she/it
- lunching participle, present
- lunched participle, past
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does lunch mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
noun
- 1
A light meal usually eaten around midday, notably when not as main meal of the day.
- 2
A break in play between the first and second sessions.
- 3
USAny small meal, especially one eaten at a social gathering.
After the funeral there was a lunch for those who didn't go to the cemetery.
- 4
obsoleteA thin piece or hunk (of bread, meat, etc.)
verb
- 1
To eat lunch.
I like to lunch in Italian restaurants.
- 2
To treat to lunch.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Lunch in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | déjeuner, dîner (Cajun), lunch , prendre déjeuner, luncher |
| German | Mittagessen, Lunch , zu Mittag essen, mittagessen |
| Portuguese | almoço, grande-almoço , almoçar |
| Spanish | almuerzo, comida, yanta, lonche, lonch, lunch |
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 lunch come from?
Recorded since 1580 in the sense “piece, hunk”. The word luncheon with the same meaning is presumably an extension on the pattern of puncheon (“cask”) and truncheon (“cudgel”). But earliest found forms of luncheon include lunshin and lunching, which are equivalent to lunch + -ing, with the suffix -ing possibly later modified to imitate a French origin. In contrast, the more common sense “light meal” is first attested for luncheon in 1652 and for lunch in 1829, so in this sense the latter is probably a shortening of the former. Lunch is possibly a derivative of lump (as hunch is from hump.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).