What does "hardtack" mean?

A large, hard biscuit made from unleavened flour and water; formerly used as a long-term staple food aboard ships.

What is a synonym for "hardtack"?

Common synonyms include: pilot biscuit, pilot bread, sea biscuit, ship biscuit, cracker, ;.

noun

noun ·Uncommon ·Advanced level

Noun

1
A large, hard biscuit made from unleavened flour and water; formerly used as a long-term staple food aboard ships. countable, uncountable
"Meronym: reefer's nut"
2
very hard unsalted biscuit or bread; a former ship's staple wordnet
3
a mountain mahogany wordnet

"Sailors were forced to eat hardtack biscuits on long journeys across the sea."

From hard + tack.

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