telephone box
noun
Simple meaning
A small enclosure housing a public telephone.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
tehluhfohnbahksSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ˈtɛləfoʊnˈbɑks
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
BritishIrelandAustralia
A small enclosure housing a public telephone (usually a payphone).
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: (British, Ireland, Australia) A small enclosure housing a public telephone (usually a payphone).
Used this way, telephone box is a word tied to one variety of English that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. It stays understated rather than dramatic. Most speakers understand it but seldom reach for it.
- Emotional tone
- Neutral
- Formality
- Neutral
- Intensity
- Mild
- How common
- Regional
- Connotation
- Matter-of-fact
- Usage feel
- Uncommon in everyday speech
Usage note
Mainly used in British English, so it may read as unusual elsewhere.
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
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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.