pipe down

British  

verb

1. informal (intr, adverb) to stop talking, making noise, etc

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pipe down Idioms  

1. Stop talking, be quiet, as in I wish you children would pipe down. This idiom is also used as an imperative, as in Pipe down! We want to listen to the opera. It comes from the navy, where the signal for all hands to turn in was sometimes sounded on a whistle or pipe. By 1900 it had been transferred to more general use.

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Example Sentences

Another microbiologist and senior doctor, Christine Peters, said she was advised by a senior colleague to "pipe down" or she would find things "hard" professionally.

From BBC • Jan. 24, 2026

Politico's Rachel Bade caught a rare break in McCarthy's otherwise stony facade when he "visibly shushed his members to pipe down."

From Salon • Feb. 8, 2023

There are flies out there who are saying to one another: “Can’t she just pipe down for five freakin’ minutes and let us enjoy the ointment?”

From The Guardian • Feb. 13, 2020

So when he heard that Rizzo had told his teammates to pipe down, Kintzler worried a misconception had ended his Nationals tenure.

From Washington Post • Aug. 20, 2018

Sometimes I have to slip off my thongs to throw at them before they’ll pipe down.

From "The Poisonwood Bible" by Barbara Kingsolver

Related Words

• cut off
• gag
• muffle
• mute
• muzzle
• quash
• quell
• squelch
• stifle
• subdue
• suppress