bugaboo
Americannoun
-
bugaboos
plural
noun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of bugaboo
Explanation
Use the noun bugaboo to describe something that causes worry, like the bugaboo of having three tests on the same day at school. Bugaboo is also another name for the creature known as the bogeyman, an imaginary monster that children believe will hurt them or even take them away if they don't behave. Some usage experts trace bugaboo to Scotland, where the now-obsolete word bogill meant "goblin, bugbear." A bugbear, in the 1580 coining of the word, was a demon that looked like a bear and ate small children.
Vocabulary lists containing bugaboo
Beowulf: A New Telling
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Vocabulary from "D.F.W.'s Favorite Grammarian"
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The Testaments
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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:
But the latest bugaboo from the banking lobby is the possibility of other companies rewarding customers for using stablecoins.
From MarketWatch ● Oct. 9, 2025
And despite getting Anthony Rizzo to pop up for the second out, the long-ball bugaboo bit him against Volpe.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 29, 2024
Slow starts have long been the Broncos’ bugaboo, but Shurmur is now 0 for 21 on opening drive touchdowns in Denver.
From Seattle Times ● Oct. 11, 2021
To wit: a literal — if incorporeal — bugaboo, the kind that has plagued and marred many an otherwise impeccable, even artful, horror film, as this one is.
From Washington Post ● Aug. 17, 2021
She had re-membered the stories of her childhood, the most loathly and ancient bugaboo her nurse had ever frightened her with.
From "Beowulf: A New Telling" by Robert Nye
But the real bugaboos in fixed income are volatility, stubborn inflation, and higher interest rates.
From Barron's ● Jun. 25, 2026
But they really seem sincere about their bugaboos.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Feb. 12, 2026
And there's an intelligence in that rendering, as if she admirably recognizes that she doesn't want her kids to inherit her bugaboos.
From Salon ● Aug. 6, 2023
“We had little small bugaboos — it wasn’t engines failing,” Mr. Moskowitz said.
From New York Times ● Jun. 10, 2021
When we once get seated at our humble board in our rural cot I won't be afraid of any bugaboos, but I didn't want them brought up then.
From Pomona's Travels A Series of Letters to the Mistress of Rudder Grange from her Former Handmaiden by Frank Richard Stockton
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Get a wordDefinitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
