boot camp

American

noun

U.S. Navy, Marines.

a camp for training recruits.

boot camp British

noun

slang a basic training camp for new recruits to the US Navy or Marine Corps
a centre for juvenile offenders, with a strict disciplinary regime, hard physical exercise, and community labour programmes

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

boot camps

plural

Etymology

Origin of boot camp

An Americanism dating back to 1940–45

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:

boot camp

With other actors he was put through a medical boot camp for speed learning of medical techniques and jargon.

From BBC ● Sep. 13, 2026

When Emily dropped him off for the trip to boot camp, Jason encouraged her to think about the CIA.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 11, 2026

The CBC in those days was a bit like a boot camp for television.

From Salon ● Jul. 5, 2026

Bernadette Joy, founder of the financial boot camp Crush Your Money Goals, paid off $300,000 of debt in three years by making small, consistent changes to her behavior.

From MarketWatch ● Apr. 11, 2026

After boot camp, Kelley had been trained as an infantry medic.

From "Boots on the Ground: America's War in Vietnam" by Elizabeth Partridge

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Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023