handphone

English

two different handphones

Alternative forms

• hand phone, hand-phone

Etymology

From hand +‎ phone. For the sense of mobile phone, compare with Chinese 手機 / 手机 (shǒujī, literally “hand machine”) and Korean 손전화 (sonjeonhwa, literally “hand telephone”).

Noun

handphone (plural handphones)

1. (Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore, Brunei, South Korea, Hawaii) A mobile phone.
2. (rare, chiefly obsolete) A telephone receiver or handset.

Descendants

• → Korean: 핸드폰 (haendeupon)

References

• “hand phone, noun.” under “hand, n.”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford: Oxford University Press, June 2021; “handphone, n.”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.