bouchonner
French, verb/bu.ʃɔ.ne/
bouchonner is spelled B-O-U-C-H-O-N-N-E-R (10 letters) and appears about once in every 31 million words in written French, the 177,898th most frequent French word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). Bouchonner is a French verb meaning “to rub down” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The French Wiktionary (Wiktionnaire) defines it as “Mettre en bouchon, chiffonner”.
What does bouchonner mean in English?
verb
- 1
to rub down
- 2
for the traffic to come to a standstill, for there to be a traffic jam
Ça bouchonne sur l'autoroute.
Source: English Wiktionary, French section, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0).
How French dictionaries define it
verb: 1. Mettre en bouchon, chiffonner. 2. Frotter avec un bouchon de paille. 3. Caresser, cajoler. 4. Faire le bouchon, flotter sans se retourner.
The definition in the French Wiktionary (Wiktionnaire), in French.
Source: French Wiktionary (Wiktionnaire), dump of September 1, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org.
Forms of bouchonner
- avoir + past participle infinitive multiword-construction
- bouchonnant gerund participle present
- ayant + past participle gerund multiword-construction participle
- bouchonné participle past
- bouchonne first-person indicative present
- bouchonnes indicative present second-person
- bouchonnons first-person indicative plural
- bouchonnez indicative plural present
- bouchonnent indicative plural present
- bouchonnais first-person imperfect indicative
- bouchonnait imperfect indicative singular
- bouchonnions first-person imperfect indicative
- bouchonniez imperfect indicative plural
- bouchonnaient imperfect indicative plural
- bouchonnai first-person historic indicative
- bouchonnas historic indicative past
- bouchonna historic indicative past
- bouchonnâmes first-person historic indicative
Source: English Wiktionary and French Wiktionary (Wiktionnaire) (dumps of September 2, 2026 and September 1, 2026).
How do you pronounce bouchonner?
- /bu.ʃɔ.ne/
- \bu.ʃɔ.ne\
Sources: English Wiktionary, French Wiktionary (Wiktionnaire) (dumps of September 2, 2026 and September 1, 2026); recordings from Wikimedia Commons.
How common is bouchonner in French?
bouchonner appears about once in every 31 million words in written French.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).