lede

American  

[leed] / lid /

Or lead

noun

1. Journalism.

   1. a short summary serving as an introduction to a news story, article, or other copy.

   2. the main and often most important news story.

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Etymology

Origin of lede

First recorded in 1950–55; altered spelling of lead ¹ ( def. ) (in the journalism sense “short introductory summary”), used in the printing trades to distinguish it from the homograph lead ² ( def. ) (in the sense “thin strip of type metal for increasing the space between lines of type”)

Example Sentences

The headlines from the Federal Open Market Committee’s policy-decision meeting this coming week will, to use journalists’ jargon, likely bury the lede.

From Barron's • Oct. 24, 2025

You can’t accuse those who title “NOVA” episodes of burying the lede with “Ancient Desert Death Trap.”

From The Wall Street Journal • Oct. 21, 2025

Five years ago, that was the tortured lede of the column that was published in the immediate wake of Bryant’s death.

From Los Angeles Times • Jan. 26, 2025

The lede was ‘To Russia without love,’ and then I wrote a sidebar, ‘My One-Round Fight With Mike Tyson.’

From Seattle Times • Jun. 3, 2024

‘Now shalte thou se what lyfe we lede, Or thou hens wende; Than thou may enfourme our kynge, Whan ye togyder lende.’

From Ballads of Robin Hood and other Outlaws Popular Ballads of the Olden Times - Fourth Series by Sidgwick, Frank