Meaning & use
couch hopping
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Meaning
noununcountableinformal
Staying for short periods with a series of friends or relatives, sleeping on their sofas, because you have no permanent home of your own.
Grammar: Uncountable: couch hopping is common among young people without housing.
Patterns
- go couch hopping
- spend months couch hopping
After losing his apartment, he spent three months couch hopping between friends.
Couch hopping is often called hidden homelessness because people are not on the street.
She went couch hopping for a year while she saved up for a deposit.
Common combinations
- go couch hopping
- He had to go couch hopping after the lease ended.
- months of couch hopping
- After months of couch hopping, she found a room.
- couch hopping teenager
- The charity helps every couch hopping teenager it can find.
- stop couch hopping
- He wanted to stop couch hopping and have a key of his own.
Synonyms and how they differ
- couch surfing
- Couch surfing can also mean choosing to stay with hosts while traveling, but couch hopping usually suggests there is no other place to live.
- sofa surfing
- Sofa surfing is the more common British phrase and means nearly the same, while couch hopping sounds more American.
- staying with friends
- Staying with friends is neutral and may be a single short visit, whereas couch hopping implies moving around repeatedly.
Word family
Commonly confused: couch hopping or couch potato?
couch hopping vs couch potato
A couch potato is someone who sits and watches television for long periods; couch hopping is about moving between places to sleep.
Practice
Daniel has no apartment and has been sleeping at a different friend's house every week. This is called ___.
Choose one answer.
Couch hopping means moving from one friend's sofa to another because of no permanent home. House sitting would mean looking after someone's home while they are away.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “couch hopping”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.