1.
phone booth; telephone booth; phone box
An enclosed booth containing a public telephone, typically found on streets, in train stations, and in public buildings. While their numbers have declined sharply with the rise of mobile phones, they remain a recognized feature of Japanese streetscapes and are maintained for emergency use.
電話ボックスで電話をかけた。
I made a call from a phone booth.
最近は電話ボックスを見かけなくなった。
You don't see phone booths much anymore these days.
災害時には携帯がつながらなくなるので、電話ボックスの場所を知っておくとよい。
Since mobile phones can lose signal during disasters, it's good to know where phone booths are.
Compound of 電話 ('telephone') and ボックス ('box'). Japan's phone booths are gradually disappearing — NTT has been reducing the number of public phones from a peak of over 900,000 in the 1980s. However, they are maintained at certain densities for disaster preparedness, as they connect through landlines that remain functional when mobile networks are overloaded.
CULTURAL NOTE:
- Japanese phone booths appear frequently in films, anime, and manga as dramatic settings
- Some decommissioned phone booths have been converted into art installations, aquariums, or book exchanges
- The 風の電話 ('wind telephone') in 岩手県 — a disconnected phone booth for people to speak to deceased loved ones — became famous after the 2011 earthquake
COMMON COLLOCATIONS:
- 電話ボックスに入る: to step into a phone booth
- 電話ボックスが撤去される: phone booths are removed
- 公衆電話ボックス: public phone booth
SIMILAR WORDS:
- 公衆電話: public telephone — refers to the phone itself rather than the enclosure
- テレホンボックス: telephone box — an alternative loanword, less common than 電話ボックス