Meaning & use
automat
Last updated
Meaning
nouncountableold-fashioned
A restaurant where you get food from machines that open when you put in coins, popular in the past.
Grammar: Countable: 'an automat' or 'two automats'.
Patterns
- eat at an automat
- a automat (rare)
- coin-operated automat
In the 1950s, my grandfather often ate lunch at an automat in New York.
The automat had rows of glass compartments with sandwiches and pie.
Automats were once common in big American cities but are now mostly gone.
Word forms
| plural | automats |
|---|
Common combinations
- eat at an automat
- They used to eat at an automat because it was quick and cheap.
- old automat
- The old automat building is now a bank.
- automat restaurant
- The automat restaurant served simple meals 24 hours a day.
Synonyms and how they differ
- cafeteria
- A cafeteria is a self-service restaurant where you choose food from a counter; an automat used machines instead of a counter.
- vending machine
- A vending machine is just the machine that dispenses items; an automat was a whole restaurant made of such machines.
Word family
- automatic adjective
- Working by itself; related to the idea of automation.
- automation noun
- The use of machines to do work automatically.
Commonly confused: automat or automate? automat or automatic?
automat vs automate
Automate is a verb meaning to make something work by machine; an automat is the old-fashioned restaurant.
automat vs automatic
Automatic is an adjective; automat is a noun.
Practice
What was an 'automat'?
Choose one answer.
An automat was a cafeteria-style restaurant with vending machines. The other options describe different things: a self-driving car, an autoloader, or a magician.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “automat”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.