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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

chatter.

Talk, especially meaningless or unimportant talk.

7 characters2 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/ˈtʃætə/Received-Pronunciation/ˈt͡ʃætɚ/General-American
  1. Talk, especially meaningless or unimportant talk.

    uncountable · usually
  2. The sound of talking.

    uncountable · usually
  3. The vocalisations of a Eurasian magpie, Pica pica.

    uncountable · usually
  4. The vocalisations of various birds or other animals.

    uncountable · usually
  5. An intermittent noise, as from vibration.

    uncountable · usually
    Proper brake adjustment will help to reduce the chatter.
  6. In national security, the degree of communication between suspect groups and individuals, used to gauge the degree of expected terrorist activity.

    uncountable · usually
    The NSA is concerned about increased chatter between known terror groups.
  7. The situation where a drill or similar tool vibrates and tears the material rather than cutting it cleanly.

    uncountable · usually
  8. A group of songbirds.

    collective · countable · usually
Where this word comes from

Etymology tree Middle English cheteren, chiteren (Imitative)der. Middle English chateren English chatter From Middle English chateren, from earlier cheteren, chiteren (“to twitter, chatter, jabber”), of imitative origin. Compare Saterland Frisian tjoaterje (“to chatter”), West Frisian tsjotterje (“to chatter”), Dutch schateren, schetteren (“chatter”), Dutch koeteren (“jabber”), Middle Low German kidderen (“to chatter”), German Low German queteln (“to chatter”), dialectal German kaudern (“to gobble (like a turkey)”), Danish kvidre (“to twitter, chirp”).

verb/ˈtʃætə/Received-Pronunciation/ˈt͡ʃætɚ/General-American
  1. To talk idly.

    intransitive
    They knitted and chattered the whole time.
  2. To make a noise by rapid collisions.

    intransitive · usually
    He was so cold that his teeth were chattering.
    The software in modern machine tools can often predict and prevent movements that would cause the cutting tool to chatter.
  3. To utter sounds which somewhat resemble language, but are inarticulate and indistinct.

Where this word comes from

Etymology tree Middle English cheteren, chiteren (Imitative)der. Middle English chateren English chatter From Middle English chateren, from earlier cheteren, chiteren (“to twitter, chatter, jabber”), of imitative origin. Compare Saterland Frisian tjoaterje (“to chatter”), West Frisian tsjotterje (“to chatter”), Dutch schateren, schetteren (“chatter”), Dutch koeteren (“jabber”), Middle Low German kidderen (“to chatter”), German Low German queteln (“to chatter”), dialectal German kaudern (“to gobble (like a turkey)”), Danish kvidre (“to twitter, chirp”).

noun/ˈtʃætə/Received-Pronunciation/ˈt͡ʃætɚ/General-American
  1. One who chats.

  2. A user of livestream chat.

    Internet
  3. A user of chat rooms.

    Internet
Where this word comes from

Etymology tree English chat Proto-Indo-European *-yósder. Proto-Italic *-āzios Latin -āriusnom. Latin -āriusbor. Proto-Germanic *-ārijaz Proto-West Germanic *-ārī Old English -ere Middle English -ere English -er English chatter From chat + -er.

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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.