brick

adjective

extremely cold (used of weather)

What does brick mean?

Brick is used as a slang adjective to describe weather that is extremely cold.

Examples of brick

Let me tell you something, it’s brick out there. It is brick. It is so cold. The weather is so cold.
—Tamron Hall, speaking on Tamron Hall (ABC), 17 Jan. 2024

I’m a New Yorker, to the core. I grew up in Brooklyn in the late 1990s and early 2000s. I know not to eat pizza with a fork. When you hear me talk, I sound like a New Yorker. I say things like, ‘it’s brick outside,’ when it’s freezing.
—Danah Abdulaziz, City Limits, 7 Mar. 2023

I forgot I have a Canada goose coat in the closet. Might be time to break it out this weather is BRICK.
—@youdoingtoomuch, X (formerly Twitter), 21 Jan. 2026

Where does brick come from?

The coldness of bricks, especially in the winter, has long been noted, and “cold as a brick” is not unheard of as an expression.

Awoke at 5 a.m. Disoriented and cold. Very cold in fact. As cold as a brick.
—Fred Brown, The Knoxville (Tennessee) News-Sentinel, 9 Oct. 1994

Neither is “brick cold” (sometimes using a different sense of cold).

With Bimbo Coles red hot and San Antonio brick cold, the Warriors jumped to a 20-4 lead.
—Jesse Barkin, The San Jose Mercury News, 18 Mar. 1999

The slang use of brick by itself to mean “cold/frigid/freezing” originated in African American English as used in New York City and its environs. It is still used primarily in New York, but is starting to spread to other locales.