Eighty-six

num, verb

num, verb ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Verb
  1. 1
    Alternative form of 86. alt-of, alternative

    "Equipment on a warship set to be upgraded or disposed of was given the code AT-6, or phonetically “eighty-six”."

Adjective
  1. 1
    being six more than eighty wordnet
Numeral
  1. 1
    The cardinal number immediately following eighty-five and preceding eighty-seven.

Synonyms

All synonyms
8686abandoncastcast awaycast off

Example

More examples

"Safety fears have been a problem since Chernobyl in nineteen eighty-six."

Etymology

Etymology 1

From eighty + six.

Etymology 2

Unknown for certain. Possibly rhyming slang for nix (“cancel, say no to”) (given by the OED), or possibly part of a code of such numbers created in the 1920s. See also: Wikipedia:86 (term) and 86.

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.