hot mic

English

Alternative forms

• hot mike

Noun

hot mic (uncountable)

1. (informal) A microphone that is turned on, especially by mistake or malfunction, and transmitting the speech of an oblivious user.
   • 2025 September 3, Oliver Holmes, Pjotr Sauer, “Hot mic catches Putin and Xi discussing organ transplants and immortality”, in The Guardian‎, →ISSN:

     The authoritarian strongmen Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping have mused on how organ transplants might lead to immortality, during a brief exchange of small talk caught on a hot mic at a military parade.

References

• “hot mic”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.
• “hot mic” (US) / “hot mic” (UK) in Macmillan English Dictionary.

Further reading

• hot mic on Wikipedia.Wikipedia