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• locker room
  locker room

  noun

  a room containing lockers, as in a gymnasium, factory, or school, for changing clothes and for the storage and safekeeping of personal belongings.
• locker-room
  locker-room

  adjective

  of, characteristic of, or suitable to conversation in a locker room; earthy or sexually explicit.

locker room

¹ American  

noun

• locker rooms
  plural

1. a room containing lockers, as in a gymnasium, factory, or school, for changing clothes and for the storage and safekeeping of personal belongings.

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locker-room ² American  

[lok-er-room, -room] / ˈlɒk ərˌrum, -ˌrʊm /

adjective

1. of, characteristic of, or suitable to conversation in a locker room; earthy or sexually explicit.

   locker-room humor.

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Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• locker rooms
  plural

Etymology

Origin of locker room¹

First recorded in 1890–95

Origin of locker-room²

First recorded in 1945–50

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

locker room locker-room

“When I get to that moment in the locker room before a very big match,” Ms. Sharapova tells Ms. Kumar Nair, “I feel like it’s my second skin, like it’s part of my body.”

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 21, 2026

When Abe Saperstein, the Globetrotters’ founder, stormed the Reds locker room in a huff, Klotz warned him, “If you let your guard down, we’ll get you again.”

From Salon ● Aug. 19, 2026

"I remember one guy said, 'I wish I could parachute outta here,'" he chuckles, dismissing it as "locker room talk".

From BBC ● Aug. 18, 2026

They’re always talking about the locker room and camaraderie.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 2, 2026

In the locker room, the lockers are in long rows, and there are aisles in between with little benches so it’s easier to change your shoes.

From "A Good Kind of Trouble" by Lisa Moore Ramée

Later, there were cheers and applause: standing near Shane in an otherwise-empty row of locker-room showers was the confident Ilya Rozanov, from Russia.

From BBC ● Jan. 17, 2026

In that one locker-room speech dressed as a news-conference answer, he showed his players that this cool persona can be tough and unafraid, and then he took it a step further.

From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 12, 2025

He tweeted, “As an athlete, I’ve been in locker rooms my entire adult life and uh, that’s not locker-room talk.”

From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 13, 2025

The book, published in 1974, had been long been criticized by some parents for its modest locker-room talk and anti-authority worldview — and enjoyed by the young in part for the same reasons.

From New York Times ● May 1, 2024

"Anu's club is going to surprise the school with a locker-room makeover. And I'm donating the materials."

From "You Bring the Distant Near" by Mitali Perkins