Meaning

Miscellaneous items of little value, especially discarded or unwanted items..

Definitions by Sense

1. Miscellaneous items of little value, especially discarded or unwanted items.
2. (attributive) Material or resources of poor quality or low value, especially resources that lack commercial value.
3. Nonsense; gibberish.
4. (slang) Any narcotic drug, especially heroin.
5. (slang) The genitalia, especially of a male.
6. (nautical) Salt beef.
7. Pieces of old cable or cordage, used for making gaskets, mats, swabs, etc., and when picked to pieces, forming oakum for filling the seams of ships.
8. (dated, countable) A fragment of any solid substance; a thick piece; a chunk.

Example Sentences

This shed is full of junk – will you help me sort it out?

She needs to find a better place to keep her junk [= belongings].

What a piece of junk!

In America alone, people spent $170 billion on “direct marketing”—junk mail of both the physical and electronic varieties—last year. Yet of those who received unsolicited adverts through the post, only 3% bought anything as a result.

junk food

junk fish; junk trees

The student put down junk for answers just to finish his homework more quickly.

The poor fellow took so much junk into his system he could only weather the greater proportion of his day in that chair with the lamp burning at noon, but in the morning he was magnificent.

Word Forms

• junks
• junking
• junked

Synonyms for junk (1,3)

Related Words

When Should You Use Junk (1,3)?

Use junk (1,3) when its meaning, tone and grammar fit the full sentence. A synonym is not always a direct replacement.

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