brick

1. a block of clay hardened by drying in the sun or burning in a kiln, and used for building, paving, etc.: traditionally, in the United States, a rectangle 2.25 × 3.75 × 8 inches (5.7 × 9.5 × 20.3 centimeters), red, brown, or yellow in color:

   A couple of bricks, picked up at a demolition site, made fine bookends.

2. blocks of hardened clay collectively as used for building, or the material of which they are made:

   The house is made of brick, but the porch is wooden.

   Clay brick can be returned to the earth without harm.

3. any block or bar having a size and shape similar to that of the small, rectangular block of hardened clay commonly used for building:

   He kept a gold brick in his safe.

   Let’s buy a brick of ice cream to have with our strawberries.

   Agents recovered 58 bricks of cocaine in the raid.

4. the length of a brick as a measure of thickness, as of a wall:

   one and a half bricks thick.

5. Basketball. a missed shot, especially one that hits the rim or backboard badly:

   His first two foul shots were bricks, but the third bounced off the backboard and went in.

6. Informal.
   1. an electronic device that has become completely nonfunctional:

      As soon as I leave the country, my phone turns into a brick.

      A hard enough impact will make your shiny new laptop become a very expensive brick.

   2. an old, heavy cell phone with limited capability (often used attributively):

      My very first cell phone was a Motorola brick.

      These brick phones only allowed people to make and receive calls and didn't even store phone numbers.

7. power brick ( def ).
8. Informal: Older Use. an admirably good or generous person.

1. to pave, line, wall, fill, or build with brick:

   He bricked our driveway and our patio, and did a great job.

2. Informal. to cause (an electronic device) to become completely nonfunctional:

   I bricked my phone while doing the upgrade.

   Who’d have thought that just adding new fonts on a tablet would brick it?

3. Basketball. to shoot a ball in such a way that it hits the rim or the backboard badly and does not go into the basket:

   She had four shots this period and bricked all but one.

1. made of, constructed with, or resembling bricks:

   My grandparents lived in a small brick house.

verb phrase

1. 1. to fill in or close up with bricks:

      They bricked up the tunnel at both ends so no one could use it.

   2. to enclose behind bricks:

      The car had been bricked up behind a false wall to hide it from the Germans during World War II.