boom

• enPR: boo͞m
  • (UK) IPA^(key): /buːm/
  • (US) IPA^(key): /bum/

  • Audio (General Australian):

    (file)

• Rhymes: -uːm

Onomatopoeic, perhaps borrowed; compare German bummen, Dutch bommen (“to hum, buzz”). The sense "a period of economic growth" is generally taken to derive from the sense "a rapid expansion", although other origins have also been suggested.

boom (third-person singular simple present booms, present participle booming, simple past and past participle boomed)

1. To make a loud, hollow, resonant sound.

   Thunder boomed in the distance and lightning flashes lit up the horizon.

   The cannon boomed, recoiled, and spewed a heavy smoke cloud.

   Beneath the cliff, the sea was booming on the rocks.

   I can hear the organ slowly booming from the chapel.

   • 1902, Arthur Conan Doyle, The Hound of the Baskervilles:

     Did you ever hear a bittern booming?

2. (transitive, figuratively, of speech) To exclaim with force, to shout, to thunder.
   • 1960, P[elham] G[renville] Wodehouse, “I AND XVII”, in Jeeves in the Offing, London: Herbert Jenkins, →OCLC:

     I was about to reach for the marmalade, when I heard the telephone tootling out in the hall and rose to attend to it. “Bertram Wooster's residence,” I said, having connected with the instrument. “Wooster in person at this end. Oh hullo,” I added, for the voice that boomed over the wire was that of Mrs Thomas Portarlington Travers of Brinkley Court, Market Snodsbury, near Droitwich – or, putting it another way, my good and deserving Aunt Dahlia.
     [...]
     “I'd give a tenner to have Aubrey Upjohn here at this moment.” “You can get him for nothing. He's in Uncle Tom's study.” Her face lit up. “He is?” [Aunt Dahlia] threw her head back and inflated the lungs. “UPJOHN!” she boomed, rather like someone calling the cattle home across the sands of Dee, and I issued a kindly word of warning. “Watch that blood pressure, old ancestor.”

3. Of a Eurasian bittern, to make its deep, resonant territorial vocalisation.
   • 1886 October – 1887 January, H[enry] Rider Haggard, She: A History of Adventure, London: Longmans, Green, and Co., published 1887, →OCLC:

     Miles on miles of quagmire, varied only by bright green strips of comparatively solid ground, and by deep and sullen pools fringed with tall rushes, in which the bitterns boomed and the frogs croaked incessantly[.]

4. (transitive) To make (something) boom.

   Men in grey robes slowly boom the drums of death.

5. (aviation) To subject to a sonic boom.
6. (slang, US, obsolete) To publicly praise.
   • 1922, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, The Problem of Thor Bridge:

     If you pull this off every paper in England and America will be booming you.

7. To rush with violence and noise, as a ship under a press of sail, before a free wind.
   • 1841, Benjamin Totten, Naval Text-book and Dictionary […] :

     She comes booming down before it.

8. (computer chess, slang) To rapidly adjust the evaluation of a position away from zero, indicating a likely win or loss.

   Antonym: moob

   • 2021 January 23, Bram Cohen, “You're doing computer chess game commentary wrong”, in Medium‎^[1], archived from the original on 2022-12-06:

     It can get fast enough that it's hard to see what flashed on your screen though, so it would be nice if chess engines had a feature of persistently showing you what move they planned to play before they boomed, even if it took less than a second for them to figure it out.

   • 2022 April 22, Matthew Sadler, “TCEC Season 22 SuperFinal: Komodo Dragon vs Stockfish”, in TCEC‎^[2], archived from the original on 2022-12-13:

     In its White game Stockfish had various moments of booming during these long thinks, but these long thinks always ended disappointingly in a slightly lower evaluation than it started with.

10. (intransitive) To flourish, grow, or progress.

    Synonyms: flourish, prosper

    The population boomed in recent years.

    Business was booming.

    • 2021 March 22, Neil Vigdor, Michael Majchrowicz, Azi Paybarah, quoting Ron DeSantis, “Miami Beach, Overwhelmed by Spring Break, Extends Emergency Curfew”, in The New York Times‎^[3], →ISSN:

      “If you look at South Florida right now, this place is booming,” Mr. DeSantis said recently. “Los Angeles isn’t booming. New York City isn’t booming.”

    • 2020, Merlin Sheldrake, Entangled Life, page 145:

      Over this period, as plants boomed, the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere dropped by 90 per cent, triggering a period of global cooling.

11. (transitive, dated) To cause to advance rapidly in price.

    to boom railroad or mining shares

12. (dated) To move quickly, often while making a booming sound.

    The train boomed off from the station.

• boom off
• boom box
• boom-boom
• boomstick
• boom town

boom (plural booms)

1. A low-pitched, resonant sound, such as of an explosion.

   the boom of the surf

2. A rapid expansion or increase.

   You should prepare for the coming boom in the tech industry.

   • 1941 March, “Notes and News: The Demand for Slate”, in Railway Magazine, page 141:

     Some of the minor Welsh 2 ft. gauge railways, we hear from Mr. N. F. G. Dalston, are enjoying a miniature boom owing to the demand for slate for the repair of damaged roofs.

3. (economics, business) A period of prosperity, growth, progress, or high market activity.

   Antonym: recession

4. (aviation) Ellipsis of sonic boom.
5. One of the calls of certain monkeys or birds.
   • 1990, Mark A. Berkley, William C. Stebbins, Comparative Perception:

     Interestingly, the blue monkey's boom and pyow calls are both long-distance signals (Brown, 1989), yet the two calls differ in respect to their susceptibility to habitat-induced degradation.

6. (computer chess, slang) An instance of booming.

   Antonym: moob

   • 2021 January 23, Bram Cohen, “You're doing computer chess game commentary wrong”, in Medium‎^[4], archived from the original on 2022-12-06:

     Some chess commentators know to excitedly point out when booms happen but they almost universally are missing out on the next step of explaining what the boom meant.

   • 2022 April 22, Matthew Sadler, “TCEC Season 22 SuperFinal: Komodo Dragon vs Stockfish”, in TCEC‎^[5], archived from the original on 2022-12-13:

     The evaluation boom and moob continued as Stockfish headed for a queen-rook-knight vs queen-rook-knight position that looked pretty nasty to me!

• → German: Boom
• Indonesian: bum
• → Japanese: ブーム (būmu)
• → Polish: boom

boom

1. Used to suggest the sound of an explosion.

   crash boom bang

   • 2020 January 12, Drachinifel, 47:06 from the start, in The Drydock - Episode 076‎^[6], archived from the original on 26 September 2022:

     In regards to what happened to Mutsu, well, it went BOOM. To be more prosaic about it, there were a number of theories put forward as to why Mutsu's magazine for its aft superfiring turret exploded, some of them more plausible than others.

2. Used to suggest something happening suddenly or unexpectedly; voilà.

   Add one cup of hot water, wait a minute, and boom — your cup of ramen is ready.

   • 1993, Vibe, volume 1, number 2:

     So we went around the corner, looked in the garbage, and, boom, there's about 16 of the tapes he didn't like!

   • 2013, Peter Westoby, Gerard Dowling, Theory and Practice of Dialogical Community Development:

     Hostile race relations and chronic unemployment are ignored in the suburbs of Paris, London and Sydney, and boom! there are riots.

3. The sound of a bass drum beating.
4. The sound of a cannon firing.

• kaboom

Borrowed from Dutch boom (“tree; pole”). Doublet of beam.

boom (plural booms)

2. (sailing) A spar extending the foot of a sail; a spar rigged outboard from a ship's side to which boats are secured in harbour.
3. A movable pole used to support a microphone or camera.
4. (by extension) A microphone supported on such a pole.
5. A horizontal member of a crane or derrick, used for lifting.
6. (electronics) The longest element of a Yagi antenna, on which the other, smaller ones are transversally mounted.
7. A floating barrier used to obstruct navigation, for military or other purposes; or used for the containment of an oil spill or to control the flow of logs from logging operations.
   • 1886, Peter Christen Asbjørnsen, translated by H.L. Brækstad, Folk and Fairy Tales, page 152:

     I went out on the timber boom and made a few casts, but with little success.

9. A wishbone-shaped piece of windsurfing equipment.
10. The section of the arm on a backhoe closest to the tractor.
12. A gymnastics apparatus similar to a balance beam.
    • 1948, Josephine Tey, Miss Pym Disposes:

      The wooden upright was now standing in the middle of the floor, and the two booms were fitted into its grooved side and hoisted as high as hands could reach. [...] Two by two, one at each end, the students proceeded along the boom, hanging by their hands, monkey-wise. [...] Two by two the students somersaulted upwards on to the high boom, turned to a sitting position sideways, and then slowly stood up on the narrow ledge.

• (nautical): buoy, cathead
• crane

• bumpkin

boom (third-person singular simple present booms, present participle booming, simple past and past participle boomed)

1. To extend, or push, with a boom or pole.

   to boom out a sail

   to boom off a boat

2. (usually with "up" or "down") To raise or lower with a crane boom.

• MOBO, mobo, moob

From Dutch boom, from Middle Dutch bôom, from Old Dutch bōm, boum, from Proto-Germanic *baumaz.

• IPA^(key): /bʊəm/

• Audio:

  (file)

boom (plural bome, diminutive boompie)

1. tree

From Middle Dutch bôom, from Old Dutch bōm, from Proto-West Germanic *baum, from Proto-Germanic *baumaz.

• IPA^(key): /boːm/

• Audio:

  (file)

• Hyphenation: boom
• Rhymes: -oːm

boom m (plural bomen, diminutive boompje n or boomken n)

1. tree
2. any solid, pole-shaped, usually wooden object
   1. beam
   2. mast

      Synonym: mast

   3. boom

      Synonym: giek

• Afrikaans: boom
• Berbice Creole Dutch: bom
• Jersey Dutch: bôm
• Negerhollands: bom, boom
  • → Virgin Islands Creole: bom (archaic)
• Polish: bom, bum
• Skepi Creole Dutch: bom, boom
• Sranan Tongo: bon
  • Aukan: bon
• → English: boom
• → Indonesian: bom (“tree, pole”), bum

Borrowed from English boom. Compare boem.

• IPA^(key): /buːm/
• Hyphenation: boom

boom m (plural booms, diminutive boompje n)

1. boom, as in a market explosion

From bodem with loss of intervocalic -d- (compare weder/weer, moeder/moer, and so forth). Sometimes spelled boôm to indicate the lost consonant (as in Neêrland).

• IPA^(key): /boːm/

• Audio:

  (file)

• Hyphenation: boom
• Rhymes: -oːm

boom m (uncountable)

1. Obsolete form of bodem (“soil”).

• M. J. Koenen & J. Endepols, Verklarend Handwoordenboek der Nederlandse Taal (tevens Vreemde-woordentolk), Groningen, Wolters-Noordhoff, 1969 (26th edition) [Dutch dictionary in Dutch]

• boom on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• Boom in the Encyclopædia Britannica (11th edition, 1911)

• boum

Borrowed from English boom.

• IPA^(key): /bum/

• Audio (Canada):

  (file)

boom m (plural booms)

1. boom (dramatically fast increase)

• ça boom
• papy boom

• “boom”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

Unadapted borrowing from English boom, from Dutch boom.

• IPA^(key): /ˈbum/
• Rhymes: -um

boom m (invariable)

1. a boom (sound)
2. a boom, rapid expansion
3. a boom (crane)

From Old Dutch bōm, from Proto-West Germanic *baum.

bôom m

1. tree
2. beam, pole
3. boom barrier

This noun needs an inflection-table template.

• Dutch: boom
  • Afrikaans: boom
  • Berbice Creole Dutch: bom
  • Jersey Dutch: bôm
  • Negerhollands: bom, boom
    • → Virgin Islands Creole: bom (archaic)
  • Polish: bom, bum
  • Skepi Creole Dutch: bom, boom
  • Sranan Tongo: bon
    • Aukan: bon
  • → English: boom
  • → Indonesian: bom (“tree, pole”), bum
• Limburgish: boum

• “boom”, in Vroegmiddelnederlands Woordenboek, 2000
• Verwijs, E., Verdam, J. (1885–1929) “boom (I)”, in Middelnederlandsch Woordenboek, The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, →ISBN, page I

Unadapted borrowing from English boom.

• IPA^(key): /ˈbum/

• Audio:

  (file)

• Rhymes: -um
• Syllabification: boom
• Homophone: bum

boom m inan

1. (economics, business) boom (period of prosperity)
2. boom (rapid expansion or increase)

• boom in Wielki słownik języka polskiego, Instytut Języka Polskiego PAN
• boom in Polish dictionaries at PWN

Unadapted borrowing from English boom.

boom m (plural booms)

1. (economics, business) boom (period of prosperity)

Unadapted borrowing from English boom.

boom n (plural boomuri)

1. (economics, business) boom

Unadapted borrowing from English boom.

• IPA^(key): /ˈbum/ [ˈbũm]
• Rhymes: -um

boom m (plural booms)

1. boom (period of prosperity or high market activity)

• bum

• “boom”, in Diccionario de la lengua española [Dictionary of the Spanish Language] (in Spanish), online version 23.7, Royal Spanish Academy [Spanish: Real Academia Española], 2023 November 28