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Synonyms

hole in the wall

British  

noun

  1. another name for cash dispenser

  2. a small dingy place, esp one difficult to find

"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
hole in the wall Idioms  

  1. A small, modest, or obscure place, as in My new apartment is just a hole in the wall, or Believe it or not, that little hole in the wall is a great restaurant. This graphic term is often used disparagingly. [First half of 1800s]

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.

Investigators later found a hole in the wall linking the two houses.

From The Wall Street Journal • Oct. 23, 2025

The restaurant, which opened in 1972, is literally a hole in the wall.

From Los Angeles Times • Jul. 12, 2025

Through a hole in the wall of one house, some crockery had remained impossibly upright on a shelf - while everything else around lay shattered or burned.

From BBC • May 7, 2025

While the commander was at lunch, Sparrow grabbed his ID, telephone and civilian clothes and headed for a hole in the wall.

From Seattle Times • Apr. 11, 2024

There was a ripped one in New York that, judging from the location of the hole in the wall, was one of the five boroughs of New York City.

From "Paper Towns" by John Green

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.