# Fritz

/ˈfɹɪts/ (US) · /fɹˈɪts/ (UK)

Source: https://englishreference.com/word/fritz
Updated: 2026-08-15

## Senses

### 1. on the fritz

noun · CEFR B2 · Informal · American English

a state of not working correctly or being broken.

For teachers: a state of disorder or malfunction, almost exclusively used in the prepositional phrase 'on the fritz'.

- The air conditioner is on the fritz again, so the living room is very hot.
- The office printer has been on the fritz all morning, forcing the administrative staff to use the slower machine in the basement.

Usage: Usually appears in the fixed idiom 'on the fritz'.

Teaching tip: While the origin is debated, it is a very common way to describe household appliances or electronics that are acting up.

### 2. to break or malfunction

verb · CEFR C1 · Informal · Slang

to stop working or to start having problems.

For teachers: to malfunction or become defective; often implies a sudden or flickering failure of an electronic component.

- The television fritzed out right in the middle of the movie.
- The ancient server fritzed after the power surge, resulting in a total loss of unsaved data from the afternoon session.

Usage: Often used with the particle 'out'.

Teaching tip: This verb form is less common than the noun idiom but is frequently heard in tech-heavy environments.

### 3. German person

noun · CEFR C2 · Archaic · British English

a name used for a German person, especially a soldier in older films or books.

For teachers: a disparaging or offensive ethnonym for a German person, particularly associated with the World Wars.

- In the old war movie, the soldiers referred to the enemy as Fritz.
- The veteran's memoir frequently used the term Fritz to refer to the opposing forces he encountered during the 1944 campaign.

Teaching tip: This sense is largely historical and can be considered offensive; learners should be aware of it for reading older literature but avoid using it in speech.

## Examples

- My old TV is on the fritz again.
- The office air conditioning went on the fritz during the hottest week of the summer, making it impossible to work.
- Just as the presentation reached its most critical data point, the projector went on the fritz, leaving the speaker to explain the complex charts from memory.

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