First recorded in 1940–45; formerly a trademark, originally a brand of washer
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
My pottery studio fee isn’t going to pay for itself—but maybe that laundromat will.
From Slate ● Apr. 20, 2026
“Have you ever seen a ‘Going Out of Business’ sign on a coin-operated laundromat?
From The Wall Street Journal ● Feb. 6, 2026
Parton and Dean met outside a laundromat in 1964, when she was 18 and he was 21.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 20, 2025
The singer, known for songs such as 9-5 and Jolene, met Dean outside a laundromat the first day she arrived in Nashville as an 18-year-old aspiring singer.
From BBC ● Mar. 7, 2025
In the summer, it feels like the entire laundromat is the inside of a dryer, and it's painful.
From "The Sky at Our Feet" by Nadia Hashimi
He’d enjoy going to the Laundromat if it means his team has reached the City Division III championship game.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 17, 2025
After that, she cooked at Fulgurances Laundromat, a Brooklyn outpost of a successful Paris restaurant.
From Salon ● Oct. 16, 2024
In 2019, The Laundromat, a Netflix film made by Steven Soderbergh about the international financial scandals revealed in the Panama Papers, featured a whole segment about scandals involving Chinese state-owned companies.
From Slate ● Jul. 21, 2023
Paul Radu, the OCCRP's co-founder, said the Laundromat scheme was one of the most significant examples of post-Soviet looting.
From BBC ● May 15, 2023
So then the Herdmans weren’t allowed in the post office or the Sunoco station, and they got thrown out of the new Laundromat the very day it opened.
From "The Best School Year Ever" by Barbara Robinson
My sons will each inherit $500K laundromats from their grandparents.
From MarketWatch ● Jan. 21, 2026
Weave Robotics has seven Isaacs dotted across the city, autonomously folding clothes for laundromats.
From BBC ● Jan. 11, 2026
Weave is building laundry-folding robots, which are being used in some San Francisco laundromats.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 26, 2025
It posted fliers in laundromats and stores, and opened offices in immigrant neighborhoods.
From New York Times ● Nov. 17, 2024
The check-cashing stores instead of banks, the rows of beauty salons, liquor stores, laundromats, funeral homes, and their graffiti-laced walls were the universal streetscape of poverty.
From "The Other Wes Moore: One Name, Two Fates" by Wes Moore
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.
