auditorium
Americannoun
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auditoriums,
plural
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auditoria
plural
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the space set apart for the audience in a theater, school, or other public building.
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a building for public gatherings; hall.
noun
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the area of a concert hall, theatre, school, etc, in which the audience sits
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a building for public gatherings or meetings
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of auditorium
Explanation
Whenever you check out a concert or a play, you sit in an auditorium — that is, the section of a theater or concert hall reserved for the audience. You can try sitting on the stage, but you'll probably be thrown out. Sometimes auditorium refers to the whole building where performances take place, not just the area for the audience. As the spelling of the word suggests, it's related to the word auditory, meaning "something related to hearing." In fact, auditorium is a Latin term meaning "a place where something is heard," — and of course, as high school and college students know all too well, that can mean lectures as well as concerts or plays.
Vocabulary lists containing auditorium
Common Senses: Aud ("Hear")
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aud
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
At the heart of the cultural centre is a 160-seat auditorium featuring a year-round film programme.
From BBC ● Oct. 8, 2026
"If that's something that gets people back in the seats and re-interested in a classic that has to just continuously fill out that auditorium, then I would say that's a good thing."
From BBC ● Sep. 9, 2026
The temple’s main courtyard had been converted into something resembling an outdoor auditorium.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 6, 2026
That night, a million hushed “sorry!’s” could be heard throughout the auditorium as hordes of alternatively inclined women — because there were mostly women — flattened themselves to move through their row.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 13, 2026
That it could be blasted over a packed auditorium, soulful sound waves sweeping over and drowning out all that was bad.
From "Sir Fig Newton and the Science of Persistence" by Sonja Thomas
Sheffield Theatres' three auditoria have a total capacity of 2,500 - the same as the National's three venues.
From BBC ● Nov. 9, 2021
On comfy seats in big auditoria, writers pretend that the 200 souls in front of them represent the world.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 9, 2020
The venue has two auditoria - one with 1,200 seats, where Peter Pan is playing, and another with a capacity of 800.
From BBC ● Aug. 16, 2019
Speaking to packed auditoria and hailed by adoring crowds, he’s been treated more like a movie star than a satirist.
From The Guardian ● Sep. 9, 2014
The auditoria are nearly all badly ventilated, and ill fitted up, the only exceptions being the Theatre Royal at Adelaide, and the Bijou in Melbourne.
From Town Life in Australia by Richard Ernest Nowell Twopeny
I passed by auditoriums with heavily fractionalized pie-charts projected onto massive screens.
From Slate ● Oct. 15, 2026
The peeling facades, faded signs and cavernous auditoriums of such cinemas are remnants of a time when going to the movies was itself the main event.
From Barron's ● Sep. 27, 2026
The steady checks from the university took the pressure off my pages as they championed my books with launch events in their auditoriums, sharing good reviews on their vast website.
From Salon ● Aug. 24, 2026
Unlike Imax or Dolby Cinema, Infinity Vision isn’t a projection format; rather, it’s a designation for auditoriums that meet certain standards for screen size, projection and sound.
From MarketWatch ● Aug. 3, 2026
During the late 1920s and 1930s black and white patrons integrated the audiences of numerous lectures, meetings, and concerts in government auditoriums and in private concert halls.
From "The Voice That Challenged a Nation: Marian Anderson and the Struggle for Equal Rights" by Russell Freedman
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Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
