British Slang For Glasses (Explained!)

The British refer to glasses in slang either as “specs” or in some areas as “bins”. There are not a great deal of other slang terms used for glasses in Britain, though there are some archaic terms, such as “goggles” that are still heard from time to time.

British slang for glasses is somewhat reserved, then.

There are really only a couple of examples that remain in widespread use, and even one of those is highly regional.

In any case, the ones that are in use have a fascinating history, as indeed do glasses linguistically in general.

Let’s find out more.

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What do the British call glasses?

The British have a few different names for glasses.

Without a doubt the most widely used slang term for glasses in Britain is just “specs” as a shortened version of “spectacles”.

Naturally, no one really says spectacles anymore, except perhaps for some regional dialects among older generations.

That said, for that very reason, one might consider “spectacles” itself a form of slang today.

Since the standard expression would just be glasses, you’d be considered quite quirky if you still used the term spectacles.

Pretty much anywhere in Britain, if you say “specs,” everyone will understand what you mean even if they wouldn’t use the term themselves.

“Can you grab my specs from the other room? I can’t see,” for example.

On the other hand, another rather particular slang term for glasses, which certainly would not be understood by any given British person, is “bins”.

How exactly you get “bins” from glasses in rhyme is an interesting question. “I’ll need to put my bins on before we start watching the film,” for example.

Finally, you may from time to time hear glasses referred to as “goggles” in British slang.

No doubt you are familiar with the concept of goggles and how they differ from glasses—but they are doubtless more similar than they are different!

Again, though, this one is really not very common at all, and is definitely more of an archaism at this point.

With all that said, where do all these terms come from?

Why do the British say specs?

“Specs”, being perhaps the most common slang term used in Britain for glasses, has a fairly simple and obvious history, as you might expect.

It is a shortened form of the word “spectacles,” which though itself is not very common as a slang term in Britain, the shortened form certainly is.

This one is a very old term.

Originally, the word spectacles was coined in the 14^th Century to mean simply glass lenses to help someone’s sight—even if that was apparatus sitting on a table, rather than something you would wear on your face.

Our first and earliest attested use of the shortened form “specs” comes to us from 1807.

We can guess that the term, then, originated sometime before this year, and has been in use in this way ever since.

Why do the British say bins?

The answer is fairly simple. In the past, “field glasses” was another name for binoculars.

That is, they are large glass lenses you would use in the field.

Thus, the slang term was applied from the opposite direction, and we got “bins” as being short for binoculars and meaning eyeglasses.

We aren’t really sure when this started being used, but binoculars were called field glasses first in the 19^th Century when binoculars were first invented.

So, it would have been sometime in the 1800s.

Why do the British say goggles?

Goggles was a term for some form of protective eyewear back in the 18^th Century.

This term was in turn borrowed from the Middle English gogelen, which meant to roll your eyes around.

The term primarily came to mean something you’d wear to protect your eyes.

Today, “goggles” mostly refers either to safety equipment or what you would wear while swimming—any British person will understand that.

So, while they might not use the term themselves, they will understand why you would call them goggles. It’s just a borrowing of a term for a slightly different, but very similar, noun.

What were glasses originally called?

Glasses, as I’ve said, were first invented in the late Medieval period.

Here, at first, they were called spectacles, as optical science was in its rudimentary stages at this point and we were starting to develop more complex lenses and viewing glasses like telescopes and observatories.

It comes as a surprise to many people that glasses were invented so far back, so in a way it is surprising there is not a greater range of slang terms to describe them.

The fact is that the ones we have are perfectly adequate, though!

So, you’ve certainly got a good few examples of slang terms that the British use for glasses, then.

Granted, you’ll only hear some of these in quite specific areas of the country, and others only used by older generations hanging on to older slang.

But they are, nonetheless, still in use to a wide extent.

More in British Slang

Founder - @PollyWebster

Polly Webster is the founder of Foreign Lingo and a seasoned traveler with a decade of exploration under her belt.

Over the past 10 years, she has journeyed to numerous countries around the globe, immersing herself in diverse cultures, traditions, and languages.

Drawing from her rich experiences, Polly now writes insightful articles about travel, languages, traditions, and cultures, sharing her unique perspectives and invaluable tips with her readers.

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