frat

American  

[frat] / fræt /

noun

Informal.

1. fraternity.

---

frat British  

/ fræt /

noun

1. slang

   1. a member of a fraternity

   2. ( as modifier )

      the frat kid

---

Etymology

Origin of frat

An Americanism dating back to 1890–95; by shortening

Explanation

A frat is a club for male college students. The stereotypical frat boy is a rich kid on spring break drinking beer, doing chest bumps, and crashing Daddy’s Mercedes. But of course some frat boys are very nice. Seriously, bro. The word frat is short for fraternity, and both words mean "body of men associated by common interest," from the Latin root fraternitatem, or "brotherhood." A frat will usually have their own house and a name made up of two or three Greek letters. A frat can be a close-knit community of young men who live, work, and volunteer in the community together. Some frats, however, are exclusionary societies that haze new members and throw drunken campus parties.

Example Sentences

The space looked like a cross between a frat house and a high-tech research lab, a fitting aesthetic for a company founded by teenagers.

From The Wall Street Journal • Mar. 11, 2026

“Those groups would end up endorsing a bunch of frat bros.”

From Slate • Dec. 18, 2025

For comfort, it’s hard to beat the sort of roomy cargo pants you would’ve found in the closets of Brad Pitt and every frat bro circa 2000.

From The Wall Street Journal • Oct. 16, 2025

The four main cast were quarantined together, which ended up becoming a little bit of a frat house.

From Salon • Aug. 4, 2024

They lived a surreal, quasi-adult existence, becoming sober straphangers as many of their peers were getting drunk at frat parties.

From "Geeks: How Two Lost Boys Rode the Internet Out of Idaho" by Jon Katz

Related Words

• camaraderie
• guild
• sorority