lockdown

UK/ˈlɒkˌdaʊn/US/ˈlɑkˌdaʊn/

nounB2Very rare — outside the 30,000 commonest English words, so you will meet it in writing rather than in speechneutral

Other forms: lockdowns

A lockdown is shutting everybody in for safety. Go into lockdown.

The word was used of prisons and schools long before 2020 gave it a new meaning. A lockdown drill is practised in schools in some countries and would be unthinkable in others.

Definitions of lockdown

1nounlockdownShutting everybody in for safety.B2
“The lockdown lasted forty minutes and turned out to be a false alarm.”

lockdown is a measure.

Where it comes from

Deverbal from lock down.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practised in Emergency & Rescue

Practise this word

lockdown in the wild

A lockdown can also be used to protect people inside a facility or, for example, a computing system, from a threat or other external event.
Lockdown
CCP general secretary Xi Jinping said he personally authorized the unprecedented lockdown of Wuhan and other cities beginning on 23 January.
COVID-19 lockdown in China
The lockdown in Wuhan set the precedent for similar measures in other Chinese cities.
COVID-19 lockdown in China
Additional lockdown restrictions mandated the temporary closure of non-essential shops and businesses.
COVID-19 lockdowns in Italy
The lockdown measures, despite being widely approved by public opinion polls, were also described as the largest suppression of constitutional rights in the history of the republic.
COVID-19 lockdowns in Italy

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From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.

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