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PlainSpell

patch

/pæt͡ʃ/noun, verb

patch is spelled P-A-T-C-H: 5 letters and one syllable. It appears 16 times per million words in written English, the 5,121st most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As a noun, patch means “A piece of cloth, or other suitable material, sewed or otherwise fixed upon a garment to repair or strengthen it, especially upon an old garment to…” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of patch is patches.

How many letters and syllables are in patch?

Letters5: P-A-T-C-H
Syllables1 (from its American pronunciation)
In writing16 times per million words; the 5,121st most frequent word form
Wrong spellings searchednone measured in search

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).

How common is patch?

Patch appears 16 times per million words in written English, the 5,121st 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 patch?

  • /pæt͡ʃ/

Patch 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-patch.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

Forms of patch

  • patches plural, present, singular, he/she/it
  • patching participle, present
  • patched participle, past

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

What does patch mean?

The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).

noun

  1. 1

    A piece of cloth, or other suitable material, sewed or otherwise fixed upon a garment to repair or strengthen it, especially upon an old garment to cover a hole.

    His sleeves had patches on the elbows where different fabric had been sewn on to replace material that had worn away.

  2. 2

    A small piece of anything used to repair damage or a breach; as, a patch on a kettle, a roof, etc.

    I can't afford to replace the roof, which is what it really needs. I'll have the roofer apply a patch.

  3. 3

    A piece of any size, used to repair something for a temporary period only, or that it is temporary because it is not meant to last long or will be removed as soon as a proper repair can be made, which will happen in the near future.

    Before you can fix a dam, you have to apply a patch to the hole so that everything can dry off.

  4. 4

    A small, usually contrasting but always somehow different or distinct, part of something else (location, time, size)

    The world economy had a rough patch in the 1930s.

  5. 5

    A small area, a small plot of land or piece of ground.

    scattered patches of trees or growing corn

  6. 6

    A local region of professional responsibility.

  7. 7

    A small piece of black silk stuck on the face or neck to heighten beauty by contrast, worn by ladies in the 17th and 18th centuries; an imitation beauty mark.

  8. 8

    A piece of material used to cover a wound.

  9. 9

    archaicA paltry fellow; a rogue; a ninny; a fool.

verb

  1. 1

    To mend by sewing on a piece or pieces of cloth, leather, or the like.

    My coat needs patching.

  2. 2

    To mend with pieces; to repair by fastening pieces on.

  3. 3

    To make out of pieces or patches, like a quilt.

    I patched together this quilt.

  4. 4

    To join or unite the pieces of; to patch the skirt.

  5. 5

    To employ a temporary, removable electronic connection, as one between two components in a communications system.

    [the control panel of hovercraft The Logos has lit up after being jumped by The Hammer] Sparky: She lives again. Crew member of The Hammer via radio: You want us to patch an uplink to reload the software, Sparky? Sparky: Yeah, that'd be swe

  6. 6

    To repair or arrange in a hasty or clumsy manner

    The truce between the two countries has been patched up.

  7. 7

    To fix or improve a computer program without a complete upgrade.

  8. 8

    To make a quick and possibly temporary change to a program.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

Patch in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

LanguageWords
Frenchpièce (piece of cloth used to repair a garment), mouche (piece of black silk stuck to the face), lopin (a small area, plot of land, or piece of ground), rustine, correctif, patch (computing: piece of data for modifying a file)
GermanFlicken, Lappen (piece of cloth used to repair a garment), Patch (computing: piece of data for modifying a file), flicken (mend by sewing on cloth), patchen (computing: update source code with a patch)
Portugueseremendo (piece of cloth used to repair a garment), patch, correção (computing: piece of data for modifying a file), remendar (mend by sewing on cloth), corrigir (computing: update source code with a patch)
Spanishparche, cureta (piece of cloth used to repair a garment), conuco (a small area, plot of land, or piece of ground), remendar (mend by sewing on cloth), parchear (computing: update source code with a patch)

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 patch come from?

From Middle English patche, of uncertain origin. Perhaps an alteration of earlier Middle English placche (“patch, spot, piece of cloth”), from Old English *plæċċ, *pleċċ (“a spot, mark, patch”), from Proto-West Germanic *plakkju, from Proto-Germanic *plakjō (“spot, stain”). For the loss of l compare pat from Middle English platten.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

What to look up after patch