pay phone

American  

noun

• pay phones
  plural

1. a public telephone requiring that the caller deposit coins or use a credit card to pay for a call.

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Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• pay phones
  plural

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Etymology

Origin of pay phone

First recorded in 1935–40

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Example Sentences

See Examples For:

pay phone

Another draw is the pay phone near Penrith in northern England, where the lead character in the cult classic “Withnail and I” harangues his agent for an acting job.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 8, 2026

PENNAN, Scotland—William Arnold drove 900 miles from his home in Cornwall this summer to a windswept pay phone on the Isle of Lewis.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 8, 2026

“We’ve never been so this is maybe our last chance,” Tom Beattie said, sitting on a bench with their border terrier Annie as his wife called her sister from the pay phone.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 8, 2026

At one point, he said, his telephone service was turned off, forcing him use a pay phone for calls.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 8, 2026

There’s a pay phone with a yellow receiver.

From "It’s Kind of a Funny Story" by Ned Vizzini

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