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• leech
  leech

  noun

  any bloodsucking or carnivorous aquatic or terrestrial worm of the class Hirudinea, certain freshwater species of which were formerly much used in medicine for bloodletting.
• Leech
  Leech

  noun

  Margaret, 1893–1974, U.S. historian, novelist, and biographer.

leech

¹ American  

[leech] / litʃ /

noun

1. any bloodsucking or carnivorous aquatic or terrestrial worm of the class Hirudinea, certain freshwater species of which were formerly much used in medicine for bloodletting.

2. a person who clings to another for personal gain, especially without giving anything in return, and usually with the implication or effect of exhausting the other's resources; parasite.

   Synonyms:

   sponger, extortionist, bloodsucker

3. Archaic. an instrument used for drawing blood.

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verb (used with object)

• leeches,
  present (3rd person singular)
• leeched,
  past participle,  past
• leeching
  present participle

1. to apply leeches to, so as to bleed.

2. to cling to and feed upon or drain, as a leech.

   His relatives leeched him until his entire fortune was exhausted.

3. Archaic. to cure; heal.

verb (used without object)

• leeches,
  present (3rd person singular)
• leeched,
  past participle,  past
• leeching
  present participle

1. to hang on to a person in the manner of a leech.

   She leeched on to him for dear life.

leech ² American  

[leech] / litʃ /

noun

Archaic.

1. a physician.

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leech ³ American  

[leech] / litʃ /

Or leach

noun

Nautical.

1. either of the lateral edges of a square sail.

2. the after edge of a fore-and-aft sail.

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Leech ⁴ American  

[leech] / litʃ /

noun

1. Margaret, 1893–1974, U.S. historian, novelist, and biographer.

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leech ¹ British  

/ liːtʃ /

noun

1. any annelid worm of the class Hirudinea, which have a sucker at each end of the body and feed on the blood or tissues of other animals See also horseleech medicinal leech

2. a person who clings to or preys on another person

3. 1. an archaic word for physician

   2. ( in combination )

      leechcraft

4. to cling or adhere persistently to something

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verb

1. (tr) to use leeches to suck the blood of (a person), as a method of medical treatment

leech ² British  

/ liːtʃ /

noun

1. nautical the after edge of a fore-and-aft sail or either of the vertical edges of a squaresail

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Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• leechlike
  adjective

Inflected Forms

Participles

• leeching
  present
• leeched
  past

Conjugated Forms

Present

• leech
  simple
• leeches
  simple
• have leeched
  perfect
• has leeched
  perfect
• am leeching
  progressive
• are leeching
  progressive
• is leeching
  progressive
• have been leeching
  perfect progressive
• has been leeching
  perfect progressive

Past

• leeched
  simple
• had leeched
  perfect
• was leeching
  progressive
• were leeching
  progressive
• had been leeching
  perfect progressive

Future

• will leech
  simple
• will have leeched
  perfect
• will be leeching
  progressive
• will have been leeching
  perfect progressive

Etymology

Origin of leech¹

First recorded before 900; Middle English lech(e), Old English lǣce, lȳce; replacing (by association with leech ² ) Middle English liche, Old English lȳce; cognate with Middle Dutch lake, leke, lieke; akin to Old English lūcan “to pull up, pull out,” Middle High German liechen “to pull”

Origin of leech²

First recorded before 950; Middle English leche, lech, lecche, Old English lǣce, lēce; cognate with Old Frisian letza, leischa, Old Saxon lāki, Old High German lāhhi, Gothic lēkeis; akin to Old Norse lǣknir

Origin of leech³

First recorded in 1480–90; earlier lek, leche, lyche; akin to Dutch lijk “leech, leech line,” Old Norse līk nautical term of uncertain meaning, but probably “bolt rope, leech line”

Explanation

A leech is a kind of worm that feeds by sucking blood from other animals. You might find yourself needing to pull a leech off your leg after swimming in a lake. Because leeches are parasites, it's common for people to use the word as a metaphor for someone who sponges off of other people. If you have a friend who is always borrowing money but never pays it back, and who is known for requesting favors without granting them in return, you can call him a leech. The blood-sucking leech was once commonly used by doctors who treated patients by "bleeding" them, a practice that's still occasionally used in medicine today.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

leech Leech leeches leeched leeching

And I wanted to leech off of that.

From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 8, 2026

Medics there aided soldiers who not only had mortar and bullet wounds but also jungle rot and fungal infections and leech bites, all inflicted by the swamps.

From New York Times ● May 31, 2024

It works according to the leech principle and is less invasive than taking blood from the arm with a needle.

From Science Daily ● May 2, 2024

As I inched up the rope, my arms ached, my left sock squished with blood from a leech bite, and I was marinating in sweat.

From National Geographic ● Jan. 23, 2024

She was sitting in the lush garden one Saturday morning with Clever clamped to her like a leech.

From "A Girl Named Disaster" by Nancy Farmer

“The discounts widened sharply after the Leech news broke, which you’d expect. But I’m not rushing in.”

From MarketWatch ● Jun. 26, 2026

I don’t know what else Leech was guilty of, if anything.

From MarketWatch ● Jun. 26, 2026

Longtime bond investor Ken Leech pleaded guilty in connection with a cherry-picking investment-fraud case just days before he was set to go to trial.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 12, 2026

Simon Leech, defending, said Slater did not spend the money "extravagantly" and used it to pay off household debts, including council tax.

From BBC ● Apr. 13, 2026

Leech the doctor comes from the Indo-European leg, which meant to collect, with numerous derivatives meaning to speak.

From "The Lives of a Cell" by Lewis Thomas

Under a chaotic canopy woven with vines and studded with fearsome spiked stems, the group crossed streams, waded through mud and picked off dozens of leeches.

From Barron's ● Jun. 25, 2026

And don’t be surprised if they decide to bring back blood-letting and leeches.

From Salon ● Feb. 19, 2026

At age 25, Birutė Galdikas, the Canadian anthropologist, was wading through swamps riddled with parasites and leeches trying to catch a glimpse of orangutans, or, as she describes them, “survivors of Eden.”

From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 30, 2025

They’re tipped into a chemical solution which leeches the gold out into the liquid.

From BBC ● Aug. 6, 2024

Dark at the root, pale at the ends, as the color leeches from our hair with the stress of Stilts life.

From "Red Queen" by Victoria Aveyard

He said: "We were absolutely blown away when we saw the contents in there, as we might have expected them to have leeched out."

From BBC ● Feb. 11, 2024

A massive environmental disaster has sent social media into a tailspin for days, following a train derailment in Ohio that leeched toxic chemicals into the ground, water and air.

From Salon ● Feb. 15, 2023

A federal-provincial cleanup tackled Brittania Mine, which once leeched acid into creeks.

From Seattle Times ● Nov. 3, 2022

“Everybody who is in his orbit, if they’ve had any integrity, it gets leeched away from them like some parasite.”

From New York Times ● Aug. 6, 2020

It was like seeing all the color leeched out of the world bit by bit.

From "Huntress" by Malinda Lo

By claiming to believe in demons, the vice president is leeching onto another youth trend, and probably getting a hefty boost in social media algorithms for it.

From Salon ● Apr. 1, 2026

These folks were, in fact, the flimsy remnants of Cuomo’s actual base: high-status opportunists leeching off one of their own.

From Slate ● Nov. 4, 2025

In the meantime, Millie told the inquiry "confusion, frustration and anxiety... was leeching into my home".

From BBC ● Jul. 9, 2025

The trick to their method: Instead of leeching with an excess of citric acid like conventional methods, they use a relatively small amount.

From Science Daily ● Nov. 15, 2024

I don’t know whether or not I will do this, but driving along I have planned it in detail even to the kind of pump, the leeching bins, the tests to determine disappearance of salinity.

From "Travels with Charley in Search of America" by John Steinbeck