squelch

American  

[skwelch] / skwɛltʃ /

verb (used with object)

1. to strike or press with crushing force; crush down; squash.

2. to put down, suppress, or silence, as with a crushing retort or argument.

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verb (used without object)

1. to make a splashing sound.

2. to tread heavily in water, mud, wet shoes, etc., with such a sound.

noun

1. a squelched or crushed mass of anything.

2. a splashing sound.

3. an act of squelching or suppressing, as by a crushing retort or argument.

4. Also called noise suppressor.  Also called squelch circuit,.  Electronics. a circuit in a receiver, as a radio receiver, that automatically reduces or eliminates noise when the receiver is tuned to a frequency at which virtually no carrier wave occurs.

squelch British  

/ skwɛltʃ /

verb

1. (intr) to walk laboriously through soft wet material or with wet shoes, making a sucking noise

2. (intr) to make such a noise

3. (tr) to crush completely; squash

4. informal (tr) to silence, as by a crushing retort

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noun

1. a squelching sound

2. something that has been squelched

3. electronics a circuit that cuts off the audio-frequency amplifier of a radio receiver in the absence of an input signal, in order to suppress background noise

4. informal a crushing remark

Other Word Forms

• squelcher noun
• squelching adjective
• squelchingly adverb
• squelchingness noun
• squelchy adjective
• unsquelched adjective

Etymology

Origin of squelch

1610–20; variant of quelch in same sense (perhaps blend of quell and quash ); initial s perhaps from squash ¹

Example Sentences

The forecast “was not enough to squelch the worry. Despite management coming out swinging, it’s the numbers, not the words, weighing on shares,” Ader wrote.

From Barron's • Jan. 29, 2026

It’s an agreeably heartfelt reminder that children are powered by an imaginative daring and purity of bonding we’d be wise to nurture, not squelch, if we’re going to learn how to inhabit the increasingly uninhabitable.

From Los Angeles Times • Jan. 23, 2026

When the Federal Reserve tried to squelch the rise of the stock market in early 1929, Mitchell announced that National City would instead lend money to support the market.

From The Wall Street Journal • Oct. 10, 2025

In fact, both Black activists and congressional champions of Reconstruction understood that race still mattered, and that made it critical to give Congress broad powers to squelch efforts to suppress or cancel out Black votes.

From Slate • Oct. 7, 2025

Washington viewed the uprising as a direct threat to the authority of the federal government and called out the militia, a massive thirteen-thousand-man army, to squelch the uprising.

From "Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation" by Joseph J. Ellis

Related Words

• crush
• extinguish
• muffle
• oppress
• repress
• smother
• squash
• stifle
• thwart