roost
noun
a perch upon which birds or fowls rest at night.
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roost
American
[roost]
/ rust /
noun
roosts
plural
-
a perch upon which birds or fowls rest at night.
-
a large cage, house, or place for fowls or birds to roost in.
-
a place for sitting, resting, or lodging.
verb (used without object)
roosts,
present (3rd person singular)
roosted,
past participle, past
roosting
present participle
-
to sit or rest on a roost, perch, etc.
-
to settle or stay, especially for the night.
idioms
-
rule the roost, to be in charge or control; dominate.
It was only too apparent that his grandfather ruled the roost.
-
come home to roost, (of an action) to revert or react unfavorably to the doer; boomerang.
an evil deed that came home to roost and ruined his life.
roost
1
British
/ ruːst /
noun
-
a place, perch, branch, etc, where birds, esp domestic fowl, rest or sleep
-
a temporary place to rest or stay
-
See rule
verb
-
(intr) to rest or sleep on a roost
-
(intr) to settle down or stay
-
to have unfavourable repercussions
Roost
2
British
/ ruːst /
noun
roost
More Idioms
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
roostsimple
-
roostssimple
-
have roostedperfect
-
has roostedperfect
-
am roostingprogressive
-
are roostingprogressive
-
is roostingprogressive
-
have been roostingperfect progressive
-
has been roostingperfect progressive
Past
-
roostedsimple
-
had roostedperfect
-
was roostingprogressive
-
were roostingprogressive
-
had been roostingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of roost
before 1100; Middle English roost (noun), Old English hrōst; cognate with Middle Dutch roest
Explanation
A roost is a place where birds or bats can sleep or rest safely. Backyard chickens need a comfortable, secure roost to stay warm and rested. You can use roost to mean the perch that birds stand on while resting, the structure that contains the perch, or even a random tree branch, in the case of a wild bird. As a verb, it means to sit or to rest: "The chickens began to roost for the evening." When someone says, "Chickens come home to roost," they mean that bad actions eventually have bad consequences. And if you "rule the roost," you're in charge.
Vocabulary lists containing roost
Words of a Feather: Unflappable Avian Vocabulary
Looking to grow your vocabulary? Check out this interactive, curated word list from our team of English language specialists at Vocabulary.com – one of over 17,000 lists we've built to help learners worldwide!
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
Interested in learning more words like this one? Our team at Vocabulary.com has got you covered! You can review flashcards, quiz yourself, practice spelling, and more – and it's all completely free to use!
Tears of a Tiger
Want to remember this word for good? Start your learning journey today with our library of interactive, themed word lists built by the experts at Vocabulary.com – we'll help you make the most of your study time!
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.
See Examples For:
And he has been patrolling the skies and the lawns since 2008, ruling the roost at the centuries old site.
From Barron's ● Jul. 1, 2026
And your little white lies will come home to roost.
From MarketWatch ● May 26, 2026
Superhero movies and action films once ruled the roost at the box office.
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 13, 2026
“The chickens are going to come home to roost and these companies will pay more sustainably over time,” Franklin said.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Feb. 13, 2026
It was a very towering sort of tower and had all manner of nooks and crannies inside it where the pigeons could roost, and they were very satisfied with themselves.
From "Hollow City" by Ransom Riggs
The documentary was originally conceived as a 10-part series titled Home to Roost, which was to follow Ozzy and wife Sharon's "attempt to re-start their lives" in Buckinghamshire.
From BBC ● Aug. 18, 2025
“Jackie and Shadow were not in the Roost Tree this morning,” wrote Sandy Steers, executive director of Friends of Big Bear Valley, Saturday.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 6, 2025
Just a few blocks from both the Ritz and Roost, The Marble Room is a steakhouse and raw bar housed in a stunning old bank.
From Salon ● Mar. 30, 2025
At Red Hen Roost, a 73-acre corn farm in New York that also sells through Handsome Brook, some hens are waiting at the barn doors first thing in the morning, owner Luke Nolt says.
From National Geographic ● Feb. 16, 2024
“He will be safer here behind the walls of Griffin’s Roost than back at camp.”
From "A Dance with Dragons" by George R. R. Martin
The development is expected to displace 130 bat roosts but Reform UK county councillor, Vernon Smith, said he was astonished by the cost of the project.
From BBC ● Mar. 30, 2026
His team has closely monitored this elusive forest-dwelling species using "smart" roosts equipped with antennas to detect implanted microchips in the bats.
From Science Daily ● Nov. 2, 2025
How about a nocturnal animal like an owl or those nighttime migrants – will they start to rustle from their roosts before they realize it’s not night?
From Salon ● Apr. 6, 2024
At dusk, hundreds of wild parrots, some in large flocks, some singly or in pairs, approach from all directions, squawking loudly and circling overhead before settling on a variety of roosts.
From National Geographic ● Dec. 13, 2023
We found the lake again just as the sun was setting and bats were screeching out of their hidden roosts.
From "Hollow City" by Ransom Riggs
To test the method, the team examined hundreds of tiny fossil bones left behind by owls that once roosted inside the cave.
From Science Daily ● Jun. 24, 2026
The team found the chimps were hardly alone in feeding on the guano, which came from a colony of Noack’s roundleaf bat that roosted in the tree.
From Science Magazine ● Apr. 22, 2024
Many of these were condors that had roosted in Arizona’s Vermilion Cliffs, the same place where captive-bred birds were first released in 1996.
From Scientific American ● Aug. 29, 2023
Bats that were fleeing this human-caused disaster roosted above pigsties in Malaysia.
From Salon ● Jan. 19, 2023
His fury so upset and bewildered the owl that it flew upward and roosted on a dead limb of the tree, staring down in disbelief.
From "Abel's Island" by William Steig
In March, the Town of Hillsborough sued Kenneth and Linda Ostrand, demanding they stop feeding a large group of the black vultures roosting on their property.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 16, 2026
The falconer says the hawk is trained not to attack pigeons or gulls but will instead scare them into roosting and nesting elsewhere.
From BBC ● Dec. 15, 2025
Expect to see and hear more chickens roosting in the next four years.
From Salon ● Mar. 31, 2025
Madison’s annual Fourth of July fireworks extravaganza raised multiple alarms, as the detonations traumatized roosting birds and sent them fleeing, many into traffic, and damaged wetland duck habitats with toxic detritus.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 6, 2024
Millions of birds were roosting in the trees—fat gray-and-white pigeons, except they didn’t coo like regular pigeons.
From "The Sea of Monsters" by Rick Riordan
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.
