spam

• Spam, SPAM

The original sense (canned ham) is a proprietary name registered by Geo. A. Hormel & Co. in U.S., 1937. It is presumed to be a conflation of either "spiced ham" or "shoulder of pork and ham"^[1] but was soon extended to other kinds of canned meat. Hormel spells the trademarked name in all upper case.

The use for unsolicited and unwanted email derives from a Monty Python's Flying Circus sketch.^[2] In the 1970 sketch, a group of Vikings in a restaurant repeatedly chant the word "spam". The earliest recorded real-life use for this sense occurs around 1993 which finds reference in a newsgroup post dated March 31, 1993, but the term may have been in use on "Multi-User Dungeons" (MUDs) in the 1980s.^[3]

• IPA^(key): /ˈspæm/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

• also (æ-raising) IPA^(key): [ˈspeəm]
• Rhymes: -æm

spam (countable and uncountable, plural spams)

2. (uncountable, rarely countable, computing, Internet) Unsolicited bulk electronic messages.

   Synonym: junk mail

   Antonym: ham

   Coordinate term: bacn

   I get far too much spam.

   I received 58 spams yesterday.

   • 2013 May 25, “No hiding place”, in The Economist‎^[4], volume 407, number 8837, page 74:

     In America alone, people spent $170 billion on “direct marketing”—junk mail of both the physical and electronic varieties—last year. Yet of those who received unsolicited adverts through the post, only 3% bought anything as a result. If the bumf arrived electronically, the take-up rate was 0.1%. And for online adverts the “conversion” into sales was a minuscule 0.01%. That means about $165 billion was spent not on drumming up business, but on annoying people, creating landfill and cluttering spam filters.

3. (uncountable, computing, Internet) Any undesired electronic content automatically generated for commercial purposes.
   • Long title, Spam Control Act (Cap. 311A, R. Ed. 2008)

     An Act to provide for the control of spam, which is unsolicited commercial communications sent in bulk by electronic mail or by text or multi-media messaging to mobile telephone numbers, and to provide for matters connected therewith.

4. (Internet) Excessive, often unwanted and repeated online messages.
5. (Internet) Ellipsis of spam account.
6. (by extension, often video games) A large quantity or multitude of anything done repetitively or considered unusually or indiscriminately repetitive.
8. A type of tinned meat made mainly from ham.

spam (third-person singular simple present spams, present participle spamming, simple past and past participle spammed)

1. (intransitive, computing, Internet) To send spam (i.e. unsolicited electronic messages.)
   • 1993 March 31, Joel Furr, “ARMM: ARMM: >>>>Ad Infinitum”, in alt.folklore.computers‎^[5] (Usenet), message-ID <d5SlxvmhmNwJ>:

     Transformed by programming ineptitude into a monster of Frankenstein proportions, it broke loose on the night of March 31, 1993 and proceeded to spam news.admin.policy with something on the order of 200 messages in which it attempted, and failed, to cancel its own messages.

2. (transitive, computing, Internet) To send spam (i.e. unsolicited electronic messages) to a person or entity.
3. (transitive, intransitive, computing, Internet) To send messages repeatedly, often with disruptive effect; to flood.
4. (transitive, by extension, computing, video games) To do something rapidly and repeatedly.

   Stop spamming that special attack!

   Spam the Z key to get a speed boost.

• Spamming on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• Official SPAM home page

• AMPS, APMs, MAPs, MPAs, amps, maps, pams, sAMP, samp

Borrowed from English spam.

spam (genitive spams)

1. (computing, Internet) Spam.

See spamme.

spam

1. imperative of spamme

• (Belgium) IPA^(key): /spɑm/
• (Netherlands) IPA^(key): /spɛm/

• Audio:

  (file)

• Hyphenation: spam

Borrowed from English spam.

spam m (uncountable, no diminutive)

1. spam (undesired electronic content)

See the etymology of the corresponding lemma form.

spam

1. inflection of spammen:
   1. first-person singular present indicative
   2. (in case of inversion) second-person singular present indicative
   3. imperative

Borrowed from English spam.

• IPA^(key): /spam/

• Audio (Switzerland (Valais)):

  (file)

• Audio (France (Toulouse)):

  (file)

• Audio (France (Vosges)):

  (file)

• Audio (France):

  (file)

• Audio (France (Vosges)):

  (file)

• Audio (France (Somain)):

  (file)

spam m (plural spams)

1. spam (meat)
2. (computing, Internet) spam

• (unsolicited email): pourriel, courriel indésirable

Borrowed from English spam.

• IPA^(key): [ˈspɛm]
• Rhymes: -ɛm

spam (plural spamek)

1. (computing, Internet) spam

spam (plural spams)

1. (computing, Internet) spam

Unadapted borrowing from English spam.

spam m (invariable)

1. (Internet) spam

• spamming

Borrowed from English spam.

• IPA^(key): /ˈspam/

• Audio:

  (file)

• Rhymes: -am
• Syllabification: spam

spam m inan

1. (computing, Internet) spam (unsolicited bulk electronic messages)

• spam in Wielki słownik języka polskiego, Instytut Języka Polskiego PAN
• spam in Polish dictionaries at PWN

Unadapted borrowing from English spam.

spam m (uncountable)

1. (computing, Internet) spam

• “spam”, in Dicionário Aulete Digital (in Portuguese), Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon Editora Digital, 2008–2026
• “spam”, in Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa (in Portuguese), Lisbon: Priberam, 2008–2026

• спам (spam) — post-1930s Cyrillic spelling

Borrowed from English spam.

• IPA^(key): /ˈspam/
• Rhymes: -am
• Hyphenation: spam

spam n (plural spamuri)

1. (computing, Internet) spam

• “spam”, in DEX online—Dicționare ale limbii române (Dictionaries of the Romanian language) (in Romanian), 2004–2026

Borrowed from English spam.

• IPA^(key): /spɛ́ːm/

spȃm m inan

1. (Internet) spam (unwanted messages)

• spȇm

Unadapted borrowing from English spam.

• IPA^(key): /ˈspam/ [ˈspãm], /esˈpam/ [esˈpãm]
• Rhymes: -am
• Syllabification: spam

spam m (plural spams)

1. (computing) spam

   Synonym: correo basura

According to Royal Spanish Academy (RAE) prescriptions, unadapted foreign words should be written in italics in a text printed in roman type, and vice versa, and in quotation marks in a manuscript text or when italics are not available. In practice, this RAE prescription is not always followed.

• “spam”, in Diccionario de la lengua española [Dictionary of the Spanish Language] (in Spanish), online version 23.8.1, Royal Spanish Academy [Spanish: Real Academia Española], 15 December 2025
• “spam”, in Diccionario de americanismos [Dictionary of Americanisms] (in Spanish), Association of Academies of the Spanish Language [Spanish: Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española], 2010

Borrowed from English spam. Earliest attested in 1997.

spam n

1. spam (unsolicited electronic messages)

   Synonym: skräppost

• spammare
• spamfilter

• spam in Svensk ordbok (SO)

Borrowed from English spam.

• IPA^(key): [spam]
• Hyphenation: spam

spam (definite accusative spamı, plural spamlar)

1. (computing, Internet) spam

As the word starts with two consonants, some Turkish people will have difficulties to spell it correctly. It may be spelled also sıpam.

• yığın mesaj

Borrowed from English spam.

• (Hà Nội) IPA^(key): [spam˧˧]
• (Huế) IPA^(key): [spam˧˧]
• (Saigon) IPA^(key): [spam˧˧]
• Phonetic spelling: xpăm

spam

1. (computing, Internet) spam