Meaning & use
the flue
Last updated
Meanings
nouncountable
A pipe or passage that carries smoke and hot gas out of a fireplace, stove, or boiler.
Grammar: Countable: a flue, the flue, blocked flues. Often used with 'up' or 'through': smoke goes up the flue.
Patterns
- a blocked flue
- up the flue
- clean the flue
Smoke was coming back into the room because the flue was blocked.
A bird had built a nest in the flue above the fireplace.
He climbed onto the roof to check the flue.
nouncountabletechnical
A tube or channel inside a machine or chimney that lets hot gases escape.
Grammar: Countable and often used in the plural for machines with several channels: the boiler flues.
Patterns
- the flue of a boiler
- exhaust flue
- flue gas
The engineer cleaned the flues of the old boiler.
Hot flue gas passes through the pipe and out of the building.
A blocked exhaust flue can be dangerous in a small room.
Word forms
| plural | flues |
|---|
Common combinations
- clean the flue
- We clean the flue every autumn before lighting the fire.
- a blocked flue
- A blocked flue can send smoke into the room.
- up the flue
- Most of the heat simply goes up the flue.
- flue gas
- The factory treats its flue gas before releasing it.
- chimney flue
- The chimney flue needs a wire cap to keep birds out.
Synonyms and how they differ
Commonly confused: the flue or flu? the flue or flew?
the flue vs flu
'Flu' (short for influenza) is an illness and sounds the same as 'flue'. The spelling with 'ue' is the smoke passage.
the flue vs flew
'Flew' is the past tense of 'fly' and is pronounced the same, but it is a verb, not a pipe.
Practice
Choose the best word: 'Smoke was rising ___ the flue.'
Choose one answer.
Smoke rises 'up' a flue, which is a vertical passage. 'On', 'at', and 'into of' do not fit this pattern.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “the flue”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.