What are compound nouns?

A compound noun is a noun that is made up of two or more words to make up a completely new world. The new word must differ from its parts. Compound nouns usually contain at least one noun, and that noun is typically the last word, but this is not always true. Adjectives, prepositions, and verbs can also be used to form compound nouns.

Some examples of compound nouns are handbag, football player, and six-pack.

Form

Compound nouns can be formed in three ways.

Closed Form	Two or more words joined together without punctuation or spaces (keyboard, minibus, baseball).
Hyphenated Form	Two or more words connected with hyphens (mother-in-law, get-together, two-year-old)
Open Form	Two more more words written with a space between each word (train station, board room, window cleaner)

Examples of Compound Nouns

When you start thinking about it, you will quickly realize how many words in English are actually compound nouns. Even the term ‘compound noun’ is a compound noun. Mind blown, right?

The following sentences include a few examples of compound nouns.

We remodeled our bathroom.
bath (noun) + room (noun) = bathroom

The full moon is tonight!
full (adjective) + moon (noun) = full moon

Google is a popular search engine.
search (verb) + engine (noun) = search engine

Meet me at the boardwalk.
board (noun) + walk (verb) = boardwalk

There has been an upturn in sales.
up (adverb) + turn (verb) = upturn

Learn about different kinds of nouns

Noun
(bicycle, Mary, idea)

Proper Noun
(Paris, Mary, Toyota)

Common Noun
(city, woman, car)

Countable Noun
(table, pencil, house)

Uncountable Noun
(water, sand, knowledge)

Abstract Noun
(freedom, kindness)

Concrete Noun
(book, tree)

Collective Noun
(family, team, class)

Compound Noun
(football player, hot dog, handbag)

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