Meanings
plural kerplunks
- informalA sound of someone or something falling and landing heavily.
If my life were a Saturday-morning cartoon, you would have heard a loud kerplunk as my stomach dropped. My poor starving stomach. It was under such stress already, and now this.
2005, Michelle Tea, chapter 15, in Rose of No Man’s Land […], 1st Harvest edition, Orlando, Fla.; Austin, Tex.: Harcourt, published 2007, →ISBN, page 125 - USdatedfigurativelyslangA disappointment which comes as a surprise.
- Used to indicate a thudding sound.
We flipped to see who'd go first and I won, which meant Claudia had to dial. I called the number out loud for her, and inside me my heart was suddenly going "kerplunk, kerplunk, kerplunk," heavy as an elephant's feet.
1986 November, Eve Bunting, chapter 7, in Sixth-grade Sleepover (An Apple Paperback), New York, N.Y.: Scholastic, →ISBN, page 41
present singular third person kerplunks · participle present kerplunking · participle past kerplunked · past kerplunked
Synonyms & antonyms
Origin
From ker- (prefix forming onomatopoeias imitating the effect or sound of a heavy object falling) + plunk (“dull thud of something landing on a surface”).
Full word history & related roots →Translations
Finnish shokkipettymys, tumps
- shokkipettymys(slang) disappointment which comes as a surprise
- tumpsused to indicate a thudding sound
- tumpsisused to indicate a thudding sound
French patatras
- patatrasused to indicate a thudding sound
German krach, bum
- krachused to indicate a thudding sound
- bumused to indicate a thudding sound
Rhymes & wordplay
Rhymes with kerplunk
All rhymes →Cite this entry
kerplunk. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 2, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/kerplunk
“kerplunk.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/kerplunk. Accessed November 2, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “kerplunk,” accessed November 2, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/kerplunk.
Source: kerplunk on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.