boonies

plural noun

boon·​ies ˈbü-nēz How to pronounce boonies (audio)
US, informal
: a thinly settled rural area : boondocks
used with the
Out here in the boonies, the electricity goes down in almost every storm.Stephen King
For those of us who grew up in the boonies or the burbs, the effort to be chic has long been a sort of metropolitan imperative.Cooke Goolrick

Examples of boonies in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web Texas’ binge buying of land in the boonies may be winding down. Dallas News, 12 Oct. 2022 That movie was so important to gay guys like me still living out in the boonies. Kelly Wynne, PEOPLE.com, 10 Mar. 2022 The boom in property sales in the boonies shows no sign of abating. Steve Brown, Dallas News, 6 July 2021 In the first three months of this year, the buying binge in the boonies continued with record purchases, according to the Texas Real Estate Research Center at Texas A&M University. Steve Brown, Dallas News, 11 May 2021 Even in the metro areas seeing the most move-outs, relatively few urban homeowners are headed to greener acres in the boonies. Steve Brown, Dallas News, 21 Dec. 2020 The boonies of Chiricahua National Monument have become a weekend home for Merrick, who spends hours using GPS to track down far-flung nesting sites. Anton L. Delgado, The Arizona Republic, 4 Dec. 2020 So people would pick offices way out in the boonies. Peter Hartlaub, San Francisco Chronicle, 25 Nov. 2020

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'boonies.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Word History

First Known Use

1954, in the meaning defined above

Time Traveler
The first known use of boonies was in 1954

Dictionary Entries Near boonies

Cite this Entry

“Boonies.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/boonies. Accessed 26 Apr. 2024.

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