road rage

noun

: a motorist's uncontrolled anger that is usually triggered by an action of another motorist and that is expressed in aggressive or violent behavior

From punching cars to shooting drivers, road rage … takes many forms.

—Natalie La Roche Pietri

Drivers reported experiencing road rage most frequently on city streets (29.18%), on freeways or highways (26.59%) and in parking lots (14.9%).

—Ashlee Tilford

—often used before another noun

a road rage incident

An apparent road rage shooting left one person wounded …

—Anna Spoerre

road rager

ˈrōd-ˌrā-jər 

noun

plural road ragers

Other drivers may have similar feelings or thoughts, but only the road rager responds with dangerous behavior: tailgating, pulling right in front of you at high speeds, running you off the road, refusing to let you into traffic, and so on.

—Michael Karson

Examples of road rage in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Read Next Texas 8-year-old shot in the head during road rage, Texas cops say. —Lauren Liebhaber, Kansas City Star, 10 Jan. 2025

Listen to this article A man was arrested for allegedly waving a machete out of his window during a road rage incident in Wolcott on Thursday. —Justin Muszynski, Hartford Courant, 10 Jan. 2025

State prosecutors at the hearing depicted Higgins, a married father of two, as having a history of road rage and of drinking up to six beers before the crash, reports the AP. —Ingrid Vasquez, People.com, 9 Jan. 2025

Tesla itself came under fire after Reuters reported how employees from 2019 through 2022 shared drivers’ sensitive videos and recordings with each other, including videos of road rage incidents and, in one case, nudity. —Bernard Condon, Los Angeles Times, 5 Jan. 2025

Word History

First Known Use

1988, in the meaning defined above