water cooler
Americannoun
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a container for holding drinking water that is cooled and drawn off by a faucet or spigot.
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a drinking fountain in which water is cooled by mechanical refrigeration.
noun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of water cooler
An Americanism dating back to 1840–50
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.
It’s the thing that everybody talks about around the water cooler on Monday.
From Salon ● Jul. 5, 2026
"They want to make water cooler shows that bring audiences together."
From BBC ● Jul. 4, 2026
The 24-year-old’s colleagues are scattered across living rooms around the country, dealing in Slack messages and emails, but never chatting by the water cooler because, well, there isn’t one.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 29, 2026
Standing awkwardly on the outside of someone else’s water cooler.
From Slate ● Apr. 12, 2026
A fan spun and a water cooler clicked.
From "Habibi" by Naomi Shihab Nye
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.
