To Be Crushed
To Collapse, To Be Ruined
intransitive verb, ichidan verb
潰す means "to crush," and this is its intransitive version: to be crushed or to collapse. Here, the focus is on the thing that's getting crushed or collapsing — and hopefully it's rare (れる) for things to get crushed or collapse in your immediate vicinity!
潰れる is used to describe something giving out from pressure and getting totally squashed or flattened. From its literal meaning of an object being ruined beyond recognition, it's also very common to hear it used figuratively for things like businesses going under, plans falling through, or even someone being too overwhelmed to hold up.
Since this word consists of a kanji with hiragana attached, you can bet that it will use the kun'yomi reading. You learned that reading already with the kanji, so you should be able to read this just fine.
箱が潰れる
a box gets crushed
家が潰れる
a house collapses
会社が潰れる
a company goes bankrupt
銀行が潰れる
a bank fails
まめが潰れる
a blister bursts
ニキビが潰れる
a pimple pops
パンがカバンの中で潰れていた。
The bread was crushed inside my bag.
その店は去年潰れてしまった。
That shop went out of business last year.
雨で遊園地に行く計画が潰れてしまった。
Our plan to go to the amusement park got ruined by the rain.
カラオケのしすぎで声が潰れて、うまく話せなかった。
I wrecked my voice doing too much karaoke and couldn't speak well.