choke

American  

[chohk] / tʃoʊk /

verb (used with object)

• chokes,
  present (3rd person singular)
• choked,
  past participle,  past
• choking
  present participle

1. to stop the breath of by squeezing or obstructing the windpipe; strangle; stifle.

2. to stop by or as if by strangling or stifling.

   The sudden wind choked his words.

3. to stop by filling; obstruct; clog.

   Grease choked the drain.

   Synonyms:

   plug, dam, block

4. to suppress (a feeling, emotion, etc.) (often followed by back ordown ).

   I managed to choke back my tears.

5. to fill chock-full.

   The storeroom was choked with furniture.

6. to seize (a log, felled tree, etc.) with a chain, cable, or the like, so as to facilitate removal.

7. to enrich the fuel mixture of (an internal-combustion engine) by diminishing the air supply to the carburetor.

8. Sports. to grip (a bat, racket, or the like) farther than usual from the end of the handle; shorten one's grip on (often followed byup ).

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verb (used without object)

• chokes,
  present (3rd person singular)
• choked,
  past participle,  past
• choking
  present participle

1. to suffer from or as from strangling or suffocating.

   He choked on a piece of food.

2. to become obstructed, clogged, or otherwise stopped.

   The words choked in her throat.

noun

1. the act or sound of choking.

2. a mechanism by which the air supply to the carburetor of an internal-combustion engine can be diminished or stopped.

3. Machinery. any mechanism that, by blocking a passage, regulates the flow of air, gas, etc.

4. Electricity. choke coil.

5. a narrowed part, as in a chokebore.

6. the bristly upper portion of the receptacle of the artichoke.

verb phrase

1. choke up

   1. to become or cause to become speechless, as from the effect of emotion or stress.

      She choked up over the sadness of the tale.

   2. to become too tense or nervous to perform well.

      Our team began to choke up in the last inning.

2. choke off to stop or obstruct by or as by choking.

   to choke off a nation's fuel supply.

choke British  

/ tʃəʊk /

verb

1. (tr) to hinder or stop the breathing of (a person or animal), esp by constricting the windpipe or by asphyxiation

2. (intr) to have trouble or fail in breathing, swallowing, or speaking

3. (tr) to block or clog up (a passage, pipe, street, etc)

4. (tr) to retard the growth or action of

   the weeds are choking my plants

5. (tr) to suppress (emotion)

   she choked her anger

6. slang (intr) to die

7. (tr) to enrich the petrol-air mixture by reducing the air supply to (a carburettor, petrol engine, etc)

8. (intr) (esp in sport) to be seized with tension and fail to perform well

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noun

1. the act or sound of choking

2. a device in the carburettor of a petrol engine that enriches the petrol-air mixture by reducing the air supply

3. any constriction or mechanism for reducing the flow of a fluid in a pipe, tube, etc

4. Also called: choke coil.  electronics an inductor having a relatively high impedance, used to prevent the passage of high frequencies or to smooth the output of a rectifier

5. the inedible centre of the head of an artichoke

Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• interchoke
  verb (used with object)
• chokeable
  adjective
• unchokeable
  adjective
• unchoked
  adjective

Inflected Forms

Participles

• choking
  present
• choked
  past

Conjugated Forms

Present

• choke
  simple
• chokes
  simple
• have choked
  perfect
• has choked
  perfect
• am choking
  progressive
• are choking
  progressive
• is choking
  progressive
• have been choking
  perfect progressive
• has been choking
  perfect progressive

Past

• choked
  simple
• had choked
  perfect
• was choking
  progressive
• were choking
  progressive
• had been choking
  perfect progressive

Future

• will choke
  simple
• will have choked
  perfect
• will be choking
  progressive
• will have been choking
  perfect progressive

Etymology

Origin of choke

1150–1200; Middle English choken, cheken, variant of achoken, acheken, Old English ācēocian to suffocate; akin to Old Norse kōk gullet

Explanation

When you choke, you are suddenly unable to breathe, often because something is stuck in your throat. Your dad's rude joke might make you gasp and choke on your grilled cheese sandwich. You might choke in a smoky room, or choke on a grape that's lodged halfway down your throat. In either case, your body can't get enough oxygen. People also choke up with emotion, figuratively choking on their sobs. Likewise, a child might complain, "This scarf chokes me!" — it's uncomfortably tight, but he's not literally unable to breathe. When the weeds in your garden outnumber the vegetables, you can also say they choke, or crowd, your plants.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

choke chokes choked choking

Evidence shows that rising temperatures choke economic activity, and that climate inaction imperils growth.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 11, 2026

Higher mortgage rates will likely continue to choke the housing market.

From MarketWatch ● Sep. 10, 2026

“I’ve got great reservations and deep doubts about the effect of the new plan to get rid of all parking and choke traffic down to one lane,” he said.

From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 9, 2026

The giant wad of cash splurged on all this would choke an elephant.

From BBC ● Aug. 27, 2026

Until this very moment, I never thought it was possible to choke on air.

From "The Sky at Our Feet" by Nadia Hashimi

"After all this time, it still chokes me up," Resta told the BBC through tears.

From BBC ● Sep. 8, 2026

It raises the cost of capital, delays investment and chokes off the very capacity needed to relieve bottlenecks.

From MarketWatch ● Jun. 6, 2026

Mr. Salam chokes up as he remembers his father: “He drove a livery cab, and then he was a bookkeeper. He did all these different jobs.”

From The Wall Street Journal ● May 1, 2026

The flea-sized psyllid bites the leaves and transmits the disease, which slowly chokes out the tree’s vascular system from the inside, taking years to finally show itself.

From Slate ● Apr. 20, 2026

Apart from the lake where people walk dogs, every season chokes up more and more paths in the woods.

From "Black Swan Green" by David Mitchell

Saudi Arabia, the world's biggest oil exporter, has relied on the Red Sea ever since Iran's Hormuz blockade choked off its shipments via the Gulf.

From Barron's ● Sep. 11, 2026

Rescue teams are racing to clear out the tunnels, choked with hardened mud and rock.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 9, 2026

Since he filed the report, Matson alleges, his neighbors’ dogs have killed two more of his ostriches, Shrek and Stella, while a third, Betty, choked on plastic trash that he claims came from their yard.

From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 3, 2026

"So he had effectively choked," said Sarah, who didn't want to use her last name.

From BBC ● Aug. 24, 2026

Conditions below were almost unbearable: the stinking, rotting sleeping bags made the air putrid, and the molting hairs choked the men as they tried to gasp for breath.

From "Shipwreck at the Bottom of the World" by Jennifer Armstrong

Signs of sleep apnoea, a disorder that causes a person's breathing to repeatedly stop and start during sleep, include pauses in breathing, choking at night, waking frequently, and suffering from morning headaches.

From BBC ● Sep. 10, 2026

The agency gave it the green light in March as a second-line tool to be used only after traditional methods for dealing with choking have failed.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 9, 2026

"When the number finally arrived, it was larger than the original commitment but still too small to satisfy a market already choking on duration."

From Barron's ● Sep. 9, 2026

Wildfires ravaging the Indonesian part of Borneo island are choking communities as far away as Malaysia with putrid haze, testing the resources and resolve of those having to endure them.

From Barron's ● Sep. 8, 2026

Before long the shoots of the paddy were tipped with brown; even as we watched, the stain spread like some terrible disease, choking out the green that meant life to us.

From "Nectar in a Sieve" by Kamala Markandaya

Related Words

• clog
• congest
• drown
• fill
• gag
• gasp
• kill
• stifle
• strangle
• suffocate