bootleg
Americannoun
-
alcoholic liquor unlawfully made, sold, or transported, without registration or payment of taxes.
-
the part of a boot that covers the leg.
-
something, as a recording, made, reproduced, or sold illegally or without authorization.
a flurry of bootlegs to cash in on the rock star's death.
verb (used with object)
-
bootlegs,
present (3rd person singular)
-
bootlegged,
past participle, past
-
bootlegging
present participle
verb (used without object)
-
bootlegs,
present (3rd person singular)
-
bootlegged,
past participle, past
-
bootlegging
present participle
adjective
-
made, sold, or transported unlawfully.
-
illegal or clandestine.
-
of or relating to bootlegging.
verb
noun
-
something made or sold illicitly, such as alcohol during Prohibition in the US
-
an illegally made copy of a CD, tape, etc
adjective
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
bootlegsimple
-
bootlegssimple
-
have bootleggedperfect
-
has bootleggedperfect
-
am bootleggingprogressive
-
are bootleggingprogressive
-
is bootleggingprogressive
-
have been bootleggingperfect progressive
-
has been bootleggingperfect progressive
Past
-
bootleggedsimple
-
had bootleggedperfect
-
was bootleggingprogressive
-
were bootleggingprogressive
-
had been bootleggingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of bootleg
An Americanism first recorded in 1625–35; boot 1 + leg; secondary senses arose from practice of hiding a liquor bottle in the leg of one's boot
Explanation
Use the adjective bootleg to describe something that is sold illegally, usually because it was stolen in the first place. If you download a movie on your computer and then sell it to a friend, it's a bootleg film. Bootleg is good for describing something that's stolen, smuggled, or pirated. You can use it as a verb, too, when you're talking about selling something illegal or obtained in a sneaky way, like secret recordings of a rock concert or contraband candy at summer camp. The word bootleg, which originally meant simply "the leg of a boot," refers to alcohol smugglers' trick of hiding flasks inside their boots.
Vocabulary lists containing bootleg
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Bradley got work dancing at Connie’s Inn, the exclusive Harlem black-and-tan club where the draw for white patrons was bootleg liquor and black entertainers.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 20, 2026
Even Cook bought bootleg copies of the song, some of which had been taped off his live sets on BBC Radio 1 and pressed to vinyl.
From BBC ● Dec. 10, 2025
Various deluxe editions also come with bootleg recordings from a 1975 concert, concert films on Blu-ray, a hardcover book with never-seen photographs, a comic-book tour poster and more.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 7, 2025
Look for X’s John Doe as a purveyor of bootleg caviar.
From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 4, 2025
And he brought me and Jazz bootleg movies to watch.
From "When I Was the Greatest" by Jason Reynolds
If you didn’t tape a copy off of your local FM station, it wasn’t hard to find somebody that did, and it became one of the first commercial R.E.M. bootlegs.
From Salon ● Oct. 7, 2026
Patrick Mahomes is coming off knee surgery, and Andy Reid will need to scheme around what he can’t do yet, mainly moving out of the pocket on bootlegs.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 9, 2026
His strengths are his mobility, being able to throw on the run, and finding different arm angles to make the pass when he rolls out of the pocket, the bootlegs.
From BBC ● Oct. 9, 2025
Stream much of Season 1 to 5 free on Pluto; bootlegs of individual episodes are easy to find online.
From New York Times ● Jan. 31, 2023
They wore broad Panama hats, flannel shirts, with no coats or vests, and strong duck trousers thrust into their bootlegs.
From The Land of Mystery by Edward Sylvester Ellis
But a growing number of fans say a crackdown on bootlegged merchandise is hampering that spirit.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 11, 2026
Hildebrandt said that a decade ago, dental students in her classes “were basically giving each other thumb drives with bootlegged copies of the head and neck.”
From Los Angeles Times ● May 20, 2024
Atlanta’s young quarterback, Desmond Ridder, bootlegged for a 6-yard touchdown on fourth-and-4 with just under 12 minutes remaining.
From Washington Times ● Sep. 17, 2023
The song has the scratchy, low quality vibe of a bootlegged demo; and the vocals are sometimes slurred and glitchy - likely to be artefacts of the AI process.
From BBC ● Apr. 17, 2023
I wish I could stop one of them and give them sage advice about the future and bootlegged exams.
From "Saints and Misfits" by S.K. Ali
The two are stunned to discover Helen’s passionate letters in addition to hints about bootlegging and a jewelry heist.
From New York Times ● Mar. 28, 2024
With four simple words, a sport that was born out of bootlegging, good ole boys and fast cars graduated from a regional sideshow to a national spectacle.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 17, 2023
“We’re in an impossible situation that’s reminiscent of the Prohibition era, where the federal government prohibited alcoholic beverages, bootlegging was rampant, and that’s exactly what’s happening in the District today,” Mendelson said.
From Washington Post ● Aug. 17, 2022
The deal is complicated by a recent ruling by the World Trade Organization that the Saudis facilitated the bootlegging of sports broadcasts, as well as the kingdom’s human rights record.
From Seattle Times ● Jun. 21, 2020
“What could be more dangerous than a fake quarantine and a town-sponsored bootlegging operation?”
From "Moon Over Manifest" by Clare Vanderpool
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
