lax
1 Americanadjective
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not strict or severe; careless or negligent: a lax attitude toward discipline.
lax morals;
a lax attitude toward discipline.
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loose or slack; not tense, rigid, or firm: a lax handshake.
a lax rope;
a lax handshake.
-
not rigidly exact or precise; vague.
lax ideas.
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open, loose, or not retentive, as diarrheal bowels.
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(of a person) having the bowels unusually loose or open.
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open or not compact; having a loosely cohering structure; porous.
lax tissue;
lax texture.
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Phonetics. (of a vowel) articulated with relatively relaxed tongue muscles.
noun
adjective
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lacking firmness; not strict
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lacking precision or definition
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not taut
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phonetics (of a speech sound) pronounced with little muscular effort and consequently having relatively imprecise accuracy of articulation and little temporal duration. In English the vowel i in bit is lax
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(of flower clusters) having loosely arranged parts
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of lax1
First recorded in 1350–1400; Middle English, from Latin laxus “loose, spacious, wide”; akin to languēre “to be sluggish, faint, unwell”; cognate with Old English slæc slack 1
Origin of lax2
First recorded in 1970–75; la(crosse) ( def. ) + x 3 ( def. ) “a cross,” (in the sense cross ( def. ), a pun on crosse, the stick used in lacrosse)
Explanation
Those parents who let their kids eat all their Halloween candy the night of October 31st? Their parenting style might be described as lax. A paperclip chain used as a bike lock? That's an example of lax security. While contemplating the word lax, you may note that it's the same as the first syllable in laxative. This is not a coincidence: lax entered English as a noun describing a substance taken or administered to relax the bowels. Interestingly, the modern definition of lax is closer to the Latin source word, laxus — an adjective meaning "loose." Now, lax can refer to any phenomenon that is insufficiently stringent or so slack as to be basically ineffectual. For example, "The entire class performed incredibly well on the test, largely due to the sleepy professor's lax supervision."
Vocabulary lists containing lax
List 2
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And Then There Were None
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Essential Three-Letter Words, Part 3
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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:
A classified May 2024 report by Israel’s comptroller general warned Israel’s aviation security had grown lax and identified major issues in the way foreign airlines entering Israeli airspace were secured.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 5, 2026
Pakistan has dealt with a number of major fires in recent years, with poor safety laws, building codes and lax enforcement often blamed for steep death tolls.
From BBC ● Aug. 26, 2026
Security at the bankrupt development was lax but oversight has since been improved, Petty said, with round-the-clock security guards, cameras, laser devices and tall metal walls topped with razor wire.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 23, 2026
Thailand's lax approach to health and safety regulations -- particularly in its bars and nightclubs -- has long raised concerns.
From Barron's ● Jul. 12, 2026
But it must be noted that Dobie’s adherence to the rules may have been a wee bit lax.
From "The Boys in the Boat: Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics" by Daniel James Brown
Supporters say the laxer regime could encourage more companies to go public; investors, hungry for data on corporate performance, oppose less-frequent reporting.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 17, 2026
More than two decades ago the country experienced what author Helen Gordon described as a "Saharan gold rush", fuelled in part by laxer regulations and a more stable political environment than some of its neighbours.
From BBC ● Aug. 9, 2025
Even within the laxer environment of immigration, where the rules of criminal detention don’t necessarily apply, there have long been additional limitations on the detention of children.
From Slate ● Jul. 31, 2025
And open-access publishers that charge authors to publish their work also have an incentive to publish as much as possible, which could lead to laxer quality control.
From Science Magazine ● May 31, 2024
Clearly the laxer disciples felt the Master's hand to be somewhat heavy and we might have guessed as much.
From Hinduism and Buddhism, An Historical Sketch, Vol. 1 by Sir Charles Eliot
He labelled the licensing system as the "laxest in Europe" as he pointed out the UK was one of only three countries to rely upon self-reporting of visual conditions affecting the ability to drive.
From BBC ● Apr. 18, 2025
But as a rapidly gentrifying city with some of the highest income inequality in the nation — and in a state with some of the laxest gun laws — gang culture has changed.
From New York Times ● Jan. 13, 2023
Today California has some of the laxest rules on the subject in the country.
From Economist ● Dec. 8, 2016
While the rest of my physique is mediocre by the laxest standards, I started adulthood with an exemplary foot.
From The New Yorker ● May 16, 2016
Really good society, even in its laxest mood, would scarcely support quite so many.
From Punch, or the London Charivari. Volume 93, September 10, 1887 by Various
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.
