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Glite Dictionary
🛏️ Bedtime signal 💡 Power loss
lights-out

lights-out

4 6.8
A sudden loss of electricity that makes a place dark
  • noun
  • /laɪts aʊt/
translation icon : apagón
  • I figure they must have gone out to a restaurant until I notice a bunch of people crowded into the small conference room with the lights out.

So and then it was lights out.

Examples

  • It's you that's the type not to make love anywhere but in bed with the lights out.

    Another Woman (1988)

  • Bang, lights out, KO pro debut, go well, and it's the start of the professional career.

  • Their house was dark, all lights out;

    Fiction book (1994)

  • I see the lights out every Wednesday.

    Fiction book (1994)

  • Lights out, prick!

    Fiction book (1994)

  • That's lights out!

    Fiction book (1994)

  • Scooter was in the cubie next to mine, and because the walls stopped a foot short of the ceiling, we could easily talk to each other after lights out.

    Academic text (2007)

  • We'd slip these little sleeper programs into power grids, dams, hospitals, and the idea was if the day came when Japan was no longer an ally, it'd be lights out.

    Snowden (2016)

  • The unexpected storm left us in the dark when the lights-out occurred during the night.

  • The sudden lights-out caught everyone by surprise, making it difficult to navigate the building.

Synonyms

darkness
vslights-out
534 1.0

A time or place with almost no light

is about an unexpected electrical event that often creates that state
outage
vslights-out
96 4.0

A time when a service like electricity or a website is not available

is specifically the sudden loss of electric light caused by service stoppage
blackout
vslights-out
87 3.9

A time when the power goes off and places go dark

is the sudden unexpected loss of light caused by such a cut
power outage
vslights-out
  • US
53 3.0

A time when the electricity goes off

means a sudden loss of electric light caused by that interruption
power failure
vslights-out
15 3.4

A sudden loss of electricity in an area

is the unexpected loss of light that often results from this stoppage
total darkness
vslights-out
8 3.5

A situation with no light at all

is the sudden electricity loss that typically causes this condition
complete darkness
vslights-out
4 2.5

A state with no light at all

is the unexpected electrical loss that often leads to this total absence
lightlessness
vslights-out
8.8

Complete darkness so you cannot see anything

is the sudden loss of electric light that can produce that complete absence

Surface Forms

lights-out singular
lights-outs plural

Morphology

lights-out = light (transparent) = out + light + s

The compound is a direct description of lights being out (a power failure or loss of lighting), so the meaning is inferable from the parts. [Postprocessing: moved 'out' from base_words to prefix]

Etymology

Lights-out is also used from the plain idea that the lights are 'out' when power fails, leaving a place in 'darkness'. So, it can mean an unexpected loss of electric light or a sudden blackout.