elbow room

noun

1

a

: room for moving the elbows freely

b

: adequate space for work or operation

a lab with plenty of elbow room

2

: free scope

elbow room to try new ideas

Synonyms

• room
• space

Examples of elbow room in a Sentence

It's a small kitchen with very little elbow room.

help me move the furniture so that we'll have enough elbow room to do some aerobics

Recent Examples on the Web

And even though it was combined with regular economy, the cabin felt spacious with ample elbow room in my row and large overhead bins that sloped up, creating the effect of an airy ceiling. —Jessica Puckett, Travel + Leisure, 29 Aug. 2025

Fishers is looking for a little more elbow room around the art center and the Nickel Plate Amphitheater. —John Tuohy, IndyStar, 13 Aug. 2025

But even so, there is a lot of elbow room: the nearest star to the sun is more than four light-years distant, separated from us by tens of trillions of kilometers. —Phil Plait, Scientific American, 26 June 2025

The property purchases by these and other companies were undertaken to enable the companies to own properties for long-term growth and elbow room, some experts believe. —George Avalos, Mercury News, 3 June 2025

Word History

First Known Use

circa 1540, in the meaning defined at sense 1a

Rhymes for elbow room

• anteroom
• assume
• backroom
• ballroom
• barroom
• bathroom
• bedroom
• boardroom
• bridegroom
• classroom
• cloakroom
• consume

Kids Definition

elbowroom

noun

el·​bow·​room

ˈel-ˌbō-ˌrüm,

-ˌru̇m

1

: room for moving the elbows freely

2

: enough space for work or operation