tollbooth

American  

[tohl-booth, -booth] / ˈtoʊlˌbuθ, -ˌbuð /

noun

tollbooths plural

1. a booth, as at a bridge or the entrance to a toll road, where a toll is collected.

2. Chiefly Scot. tolbooth.

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tollbooth British  

/ ˈtəʊlˌbuːθ, ˈtɒl-, -ˌbuːð /

noun

1. a booth or kiosk at which a toll is collected

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Other Word Forms

Inflected Forms

noun

• tollbooths
  plural

Etymology

Origin of tollbooth

First recorded in 1300–50, tollbooth is from the Middle English word tolbothe. See toll ¹, booth

Explanation

The highway kiosk where you stop and pay a fee is called a tollbooth. In the classic novel The Phantom Tollbooth, a boy drives his toy car through a magical tollbooth and is transported to a strange land. If your car has a transponder, a special electronic device, you can drive slowly past a tollbooth and pay automatically, rather than stopping and handing money to a toll collector. Only toll roads or turnpikes have tollbooths — drivers pay based on the size of their vehicle, and the toll revenue contributes to maintaining the road. The oldest tollbooths, called toll houses, were built in England, Wales, and Scotland during the 18th century.

Example Sentences

Police can dust a crime scene for fingerprints and get surveillance footage or nearby tollbooth records without identifying the suspect in advance.

From The Wall Street Journal • Apr. 26, 2026

It has come to prominence recently and been dubbed "Tehran's tollbooth" -- a stopping-off point for the handful of vessels that Iran has approved to exit or enter the Gulf.

From Barron's • Mar. 27, 2026

Iran maintained what Lloyd’s List Intelligence called a tollbooth regime over the Strait of Hormuz as diplomatic efforts didn’t generate any tangible results.

From MarketWatch • Mar. 26, 2026

So that when people were driving to D.C., when they stopped at a tollbooth, they were given a piece of paper, told where to go, where to park, what to do.

From Los Angeles Times • Sep. 12, 2023

School went very quickly the next day, but not quickly enough, for Milo’s head was full of plans and his eyes could see nothing but the tollbooth and what lay beyond.

From "The Phantom Tollbooth" by Norton Juster