congestion
noun
Simple meaning
The hindrance or blockage of the passage of something, for example a fluid, mixture, traffic, people, etc., resulting in overfilling or overcrowding.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
kuhnjehschuhnSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
kənˈdʒɛstʃən
This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.
IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.
Definition
Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.
noun
The hindrance or blockage of the passage of something, for example a fluid, mixture, traffic, people, etc. (due to an excess of this or due to a partial or complete obstruction), resulting in overfilling or overcrowding.
An excess of traffic; usually not a complete standstill of traffic, so usually not synonymous with traffic jam.
medicine
An excess of mucus or fluid in the respiratory system; congestion of the lungs, or nasal congestion.
Excessive accumulation of blood or other fluid in a body part
Edema, water retention, swelling, enlargement of a body part because of fluid retention in tissues and vessels.
An accumulation or buildup, the act of gathering into a heap or mass.
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- B1 · Intermediate (estimated)
- Frequency
- Moderately Common
- Typical Use
- General and technical use
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: The hindrance or blockage of the passage of something, for example a fluid, mixture, traffic, people, etc. (due to an excess of this or due to a partial or complete obstruction), resulting in overfilling or overcrowding.
Used this way, congestion is a reasonably familiar word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. It usually sounds natural in a wide range of settings.
- Emotional tone
- Neutral
- Formality
- Neutral
- Intensity
- Not strongly marked
- How common
- Moderately common
- Connotation
- Matter-of-fact
- Usage feel
- Neutral and straightforward
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
More ways to use congestion
- “Rush hour traffic causes daily congestion in the city.”
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Common Patterns and Combinations
How this word naturally appears with others.
Word Family
Related forms, grouped by how they connect.
Compound terms
Established multiword terms.
Congestion in the lungs.
Related Words
Connected to the same idea, not synonyms.
- freewaynoun
- motorwaynoun
- expresswaynoun
- interchangenoun
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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.