coffeehouse
Americannoun
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coffeehouses
plural
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a public place that specializes in serving coffee and other refreshments and that sometimes provides informal entertainment.
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(in 17th- and 18th-century England) a similar establishment where groups met for a particular purpose, as for informal discussions or card playing.
verb (used without object)
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Informal. to engage in aimless talk or chitchat.
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Cards. to make remarks and gestures during play with the purpose of misleading opponents as to the cards one holds.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of coffeehouse
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:
Yet Kay never stopped writing songs; occasionally she’d even perform them at school coffeehouse nights.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 6, 2026
Between his coffeehouse, wife and three kids, it all got spent.
From MarketWatch ● Feb. 24, 2026
To succeed, Starbucks must pull off a delicate balancing act: revive the classic coffeehouse atmosphere while reminding customers that it also offers an entirely different universe of beverages and snacks tailored to the afternoon.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Feb. 20, 2026
Consider Joseph Morgan III. Born in 1780 into a Welsh immigrant family that became successful Massachusetts farmers, he sold the farm and invested in a Hartford, Conn., coffeehouse and stagecoach line.
From Barron's ● Jan. 13, 2026
The horse stopped in front of the coffeehouse, puffing and wheezing.
From "Fever 1793" by Laurie Halse Anderson
These changes are part of Niccol’s turnaround strategy at Starbucks, which aims to address slow service and overly busy coffeehouses.
From MarketWatch ● May 6, 2026
Executives said during an investor event in January that it could add as many as 5,000 U.S. coffeehouses over time.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Mar. 3, 2026
This was the vision that former CEO Howard Schultz had long chased: bringing Italian-style coffeehouses to the U.S. and transforming them into a ubiquitous “third place” for Americans.
From Slate ● Dec. 22, 2025
Starbucks will enter the Olympic arena for the first time by providing specially designed coffeehouses in the Olympic and Paralympic village, competition venues and volunteer hubs for athletes, fans and spectators.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 16, 2025
The markets bustled with activity; the taverns and coffeehouses buzzed with conversation; the federal, state, and local governments took up the business they had left off in September.
From "An American Plague: The True and Terrifying Story of the Yellow Fever Epidemic of 1793" by Jim Murphy
Definitions 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.
