jukebox

[jook-boks]

SEE MORE SYNONYMS FOR jukebox ON THESAURUS.COM

noun

a coin-operated phonograph, typically in a gaudy, illuminated cabinet, having a variety of records that can be selected by push button.

Origin of jukebox

1915–20; juke² (joint) + box¹

Also called juke.

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2019

Related Words for jukebox

jukebox, orchestrina, orchestrion

Examples from the Web for jukebox

Contemporary Examples of jukebox

The jukebox plays a medley of sixties tunes, an apt and agreeable feature.
All Hail Richard Hamilton, the Father of British Pop Art
Chloë Ashby
February 22, 2014
He made suggestions to the manager of the drive-in burger restaurant about what should be on the jukebox.
P.J. O’Rourke on Grabbing the Keys to Happiness
P. J. O’Rourke
January 24, 2014
Think of the way a song seems to jump out of a car radio or a jukebox, and then add the high fidelity of a good sound system.
Classic Miles Davis Recordings Reveal New Beauty in Their Classic Mono Format
Malcolm Jones
December 8, 2013
The jukebox blasts “Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In” by the 5th Dimension.
Dennis Hopper and the Cult of Nonreaders
Tom Folsom
March 8, 2013
It is best heard wafting from a jukebox or over a glass of whiskey.
The Yes List—The National's All-American Rock
The Daily Beast
May 13, 2010

Historical Examples of jukebox

Thoughtfully sipping my beer I heard him dial and report a jukebox out of order.
Cue for Quiet
Thomas L. Sherred
While Harry was drawing the beer I walked string straight to the jukebox, clicked in a quarter, and stalked back to the barstool.
Cue for Quiet
Thomas L. Sherred
I told her the jukebox and the television set were out of commission and there'd be no noise she didn't make herself.
Cue for Quiet
Thomas L. Sherred
At Art's that night I listened with envy to the words that were used over the telephone when the jukebox gave up its ghost.
Cue for Quiet
Thomas L. Sherred
He pushed in through the outer and inner doors, and he heard the burst of music from the jukebox.
The Man Who Hated Mars
Gordon Randall Garrett

British Dictionary definitions for jukebox

jukebox

noun

a coin-operated machine, usually found in pubs, clubs, etc, that contains records, CDs, or videos, which are played when selected by a customer

Word Origin for jukebox

C20: from Gullah juke bawdy (as in juke house brothel) + box 1

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

Word Origin and History for jukebox

1937, jook organ, from jook joint "roadhouse" (1935), Black English slang, from juke, joog "wicked, disorderly," in Gullah (the creolized English of the coastlands of South Carolina, Georgia, and northern Florida), probably from Wolof and Bambara dzug "unsavory." Said to have originated in central Florida (see "A Note on Juke," Florida Review, vol. VII, no. 3, spring 1938). The spelling with a -u- might represent a deliberate attempt to put distance between the word and its origins.

For a long time the commercial juke trade resisted the name juke box and even tried to raise a big publicity fund to wage a national campaign against it, but "juke box" turned out to be the biggest advertising term that could ever have been invented for the commercial phonograph and spread to the ends of the world during the war as American soldiers went abroad but remembered the juke boxes back home. ["Billboard," Sept. 15, 1945]