Booster

How to spell booster

7 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce booster

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does booster mean?

1. nounA person or thing that increases the strength, power, or reputation of something.
2. nounAn additional dose of a vaccine given to renew or strengthen earlier immunity.
3. nounA rocket or engine that provides the main initial thrust to launch a vehicle.

Booster in a sentence

• The new espresso machine was a real morale booster for the office.

• The clinic sent a reminder that her tetanus booster was now due.

• The first booster separated cleanly moments after lift-off.

• A small signal booster extended the wifi to the far end of the house.

• Older patients were offered an autumn flu booster at the surgery.

• Engineers recovered the spent booster from the ocean for reuse.

Where does booster come from?

Language of origin: Unknown

Booster is built from the verb 'boost', which appeared in American English in the early 1800s meaning to push or shove something upward, as in giving someone a leg up over a fence. The origin of 'boost' itself is genuinely obscure; it seems to be a homegrown American coinage with no clear ancestor in older English or any foreign language, so it is often labelled of unknown origin. Adding the agent suffix '-er' produced 'booster', literally 'a thing or person that boosts'. Over the twentieth century the word stretched into several specialised fields: an enthusiastic promoter of a town or cause, an extra dose that reinforces a vaccine, and a rocket stage that supplies the initial thrust. Because the spelling simply joins 'boost' and '-er', the only thing to remember is the double 'o' carried straight over from the verb.

How the word is built

• boost (to raise or push up)
• -er (agent noun suffix: one that does)