jailbreak

1 of 2

noun

jail·​break ˈjāl-ˌbrāk 

: a forcible escape from jail

jailbreak

2 of 2

verb

jailbroke ˈjāl-ˌbrōk  ; jailbreaking; jailbreaks

transitive verb

: to remove built-in limitations from (an electronic device, such as a cell phone)

I'm not trying to be overly snarky here, but for … in-house app distribution, I see no need or advantage to jailbreaking an iOS device.

—John Welch

Last week we learned you can jailbreak every current model of Kindle.

—Thorin Klosowski

Apple makes it nearly impossible for the average user to download apps from anywhere else unless you jailbreak your phone.

—Peter Wells

Examples of jailbreak in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Noun

Attackers are already exploiting vulnerabilities through prompt injection, jailbreaks, and system prompt extraction. —Tony Bradley, Forbes.com, 28 May 2025

For example, one group used an LLM proxy to resell access to the model, while others leveraged jailbreaks to create and sell uncensored chatbot characters. —Jonathan Fischbein, Forbes.com, 22 July 2025

Verb

Rodriguez also notes that his hacking technique could be used not just by a driver who wants to jailbreak their own plate, but also by someone targeting an unwitting owner of a plate too. —Andy Greenberg, WIRED, 16 Dec. 2024

Plus, most jailbreaks only work on outdated hardware and old versions of the firmware, Apple argues, because the vulnerabilities used to achieve jailbreaks get patched. —Lily Hay Newman, WIRED, 22 July 2020

Word History

First Known Use

Noun

1910, in the meaning defined above

Verb

2007, in the meaning defined above

Rhymes for jailbreak

• awake
• backache
• beefsteak
• betake
• cheesecake
• cupcake
• daybreak
• earthquake
• eastlake
• forsake
• handshake
• headache

Kids Definition

jailbreak

noun

jail·​break -ˌbrāk 

: an escape from jail by use of force