cays

IPA/kiː/
IPA/kiː/

cays — noun

  • cayssingular
  • caysesplural

1. a small island on a coral reef in warm tropical seas, built up from sand, broken

1.nounC1
Definition

a small island on a coral reef in warm tropical seas, built up from sand, broken coral, and rock

Example

The cays off Belize are famous for their white sand and clear blue water.

collocation: famous for [location, feature]

Many seabirds nest on the cays that lie between the mainland and the barrier reef.

Common collocations
  • sandy cays
  • coral cays
  • low cays
  • remote cays
  • tropical cays
Synonyms
  • islet

    a general term for any small island — does not specify that it is tropical or reef-based

  • key

    a spelling variant of cay, used especially in place names such as the Florida Keys

  • coral island

    a broader category that includes larger islands formed from coral; a cay is a specific type of low coral island

Grammar Patterns

plural noun

Usage Note

A cay is formed on or near a coral reef, unlike a volcanic or continental island — it is a low, sandy accumulation rather than a rocky landmass.

Common Mistakes

The cays near Hawaii are volcanic.
The cays near Hawaii are low sandy islands formed on coral reefs.
Cays are built from sand and coral, not volcanic rock.
We visited a cay in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean.
We visited a cay in the Caribbean Sea.
Cays are found only in warm tropical waters, typically near a reef.

Word family

Synonym discussion

Sense: noun/1

Cay, islet, key, and atoll all refer to small islands, but they differ in formation and location. A cay (or its variant spelling key, as in the Florida Keys) is specifically a low island built from sand and coral debris on a tropical coral reef. An islet is a general term for any very small island, regardless of geology or climate — a rocky island in a cold lake qualifies as an islet. An atoll is a ring-shaped coral reef enclosing a lagoon; while an atoll may contain cays along its rim, it is a much larger, continuous reef structure rather than an individual island. For example, the San Blas Islands are cays; a mid-lake rock in Ontario is an islet; and the Maldives form a chain of atolls.

cay ↗islet ↗key ↗atoll ↗

Common collocations

Adjectives

Etymology

TaínoSpanishEnglish

Borrowed from Spanish 'cayo', itself taken from the Taíno word for a small island or sandbar. The variant spelling 'key' (as in 'Florida Keys') comes from the same Spanish source, influenced by English spelling conventions.

First known use

1707

1707, in the meaning defined above