break down
— phrasal verb with break uk/breɪk/us/breɪk/verb broke, broken
(MACHINE)
B2 If a machine or vehicle breaks down, it stops working:
Our car broke down and we had to push it off the road.
More examples
- The school bus broke down and had to be towed to the nearest garage.
- Oh no - has your washing machine broken down again?
- I'm worried that his car has broken down, or worse still, that he's had an accident.
- If the central heating breaks down again, I will refuse to pay the repair bill.
- Our dishwasher broke down just a month after the guarantee had expired.
Thesaurus: synonyms and related words
Machines - not functioning
- act
- burn
- cut
- deactivate
- dead
- defunct
- disable
- fritz
- give up the ghost idiom
- haywire
- on the blink idiom
- out of commission idiom
- seize
- shudder
- shut
- shut (sth) off
- stop
- unusable
- whack
- wrong
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(COMMUNICATION)
If a system, relationship, or discussion breaks down, it fails because there is a problem or disagreement.
Thesaurus: synonyms and related words
Causing something to end
- abandon
- all good things (must) come to an end idiom
- and have done with it idiom
- be over the hump idiom
- bitter
- draw
- knock off (sth)
- lay
- lay sth to rest idiom
- lay the ghost of sth (to rest) idiom
- leave it at that idiom
- leave off (sth/doing sth)
- lid
- lift
- raise
- suppression
- the curtain falls on sth idiom
- to the bitter end idiom
- top sth off
- walk
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(CRY)
to be unable to control your feelings and to start to cry:
When we gave her the bad news, she broke down and cried.
Thesaurus: synonyms and related words
Weeping and crying
- bawl
- bucket
- burst
- burst out laughing/crying idiom
- crocodile tears
- crumple
- dissolve
- dry your eyes idiom
- lachrymose
- mist
- mist (sth) over/up
- misty-eyed
- not a dry eye in the house idiom
- not know whether to laugh or cry idiom
- sniffle
- snuffle
- tear 1
- weep
- weepy
- wept
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