Latency (engineering), a time delay between the moment something is initiated and the moment its first effect begins.

Virus latency, the "quiet" or dormant stage of life of a virus, when it does little but maintain its genome, until favourable conditions for the lytic phase appear, when it starts to replicate.

Dormancy is a period in an organism's life cycle when growth, development, and (in animals) physical activity is temporarily suspended. This minimizes metabolic activity and therefore helps an organism to conserve energy. Dormancy tends to be closely...

Latent heat, the amount of energy released or absorbed by a substance during a change of phase

Latent geologic fault

Input lag, the latency between using an input device and the result being displayed.

Latent bud, in some plants a bud that grows in favourable conditions but remains a bud until such conditions appear.

Latent Recordings, a record label

Communication lag or latency, the time taken for a packet of data to be sent by an application, travel and be received by another application.

Incubation period, the time between exposure to a pathogenic organism, or chemical or radiation, and when symptoms and signs are first apparent.

Latency (audio), the time delay in digital audio systems due to analog to digital conversions, processing and conversion back to analog.

Clinical latency

Latent fingerprint, the identifiable impression made by a finger, which is not immediately available (for example, because it is on a difficult surface such as skin) but can be made available ("developed") using some appropriate technique.

Memory latency and RAM latency, the amount of time a computer needs to wait to get data from RAM.

Latency in child sexuality, a psychoanalytic phase, extending from roughly age 7 to 12, during which sexuality is repressed or sublimated (now more commonly called "middle childhood" and "prepubescence").