Meaning & use
prison cell
Last updated
Meaning
nouncountable
A small room inside a prison where a prisoner is kept locked up, usually with a bed and a toilet.
Grammar: Countable: a prison cell, two prison cells. People are held in a cell or in cells.
Patterns
- in a prison cell
- share a prison cell with someone
He spent twelve years in a tiny prison cell.
The guard unlocked the prison cell and led him out.
Two inmates shared a prison cell built for one.
Word forms
| plural | prison cells |
|---|
Common combinations
- locked in a prison cell
- He was locked in a prison cell overnight.
- a bare prison cell
- The writer described a bare prison cell with one window.
- share a prison cell
- Two strangers had to share a prison cell.
- escape from a prison cell
- The film shows a man planning to escape from a prison cell.
- solitary prison cell
- She was kept in a solitary prison cell for a week.
Synonyms and how they differ
- cell
- Cell alone is the shorter and more common word, and prison cell is used when context needs to be clear.
- jail cell
- Jail cell is common in American English and often suggests a short-term holding place, whereas a prison cell suggests a longer sentence.
- dungeon
- A dungeon is an old underground prison, so it feels historical or dramatic compared with a modern prison cell.
Word family
- prison noun
- the whole building where criminals are held
- prisoner noun
- a person held in prison
- imprison verb
- to put someone in prison
- imprisonment noun
- the state of being held in prison
Commonly confused: prison cell or jail?
prison cell vs jail
Jail is a short-term holding facility in strict US usage, while prison holds convicted criminals for longer terms. Learners often treat them as identical.
Practice
What is a prison cell?
Choose one answer.
A prison cell is an individual locked room. The whole building is the prison, and the other options are different rooms.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “prison cell”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.