killer
Americannoun
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a device used by a post office for printing cancellations on postage stamps.
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a mark of cancellation made on a postage stamp.
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Slang. something or someone having a formidable impact, devastating effect, etc..
The math test was a real killer.
adjective
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severe; powerful.
a killer cold.
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very difficult or demanding.
a killer chess tournament.
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highly effective; superior.
a killer recipe for fried chicken.
noun
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a person or animal that kills, esp habitually
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( as modifier )
a killer shark
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something, esp a task or activity, that is particularly taxing or exhausting
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an animal selected to be slaughtered for food
Usage
What is a basic definition of killer? A killer is a person or thing that kills, meaning they end lives. Killer is also used in slang to mean something that is devastating or exhausting. Additionally, killer is used in slang to describe something as severe or powerful. Killer has several other meanings as a noun and an adjective.A person or thing that ends someone’s life is a killer. In terms of a person, killer is often used interchangeably with murderer. However, killer can refer to someone who killed another person by accident, while murderer is not used in that sense.
- Real-life examples: John Wilkes Booth was Abraham Lincoln’s killer. Jack the Ripper was an infamous killer. Bacteria and viruses often act as natural killers. People use weed killers on their lawns.
- Used in a sentence: My cat is a very effective killer of birds.
- Real-life examples: You might call a particularly hard test a killer test. A killer workout would push your body to the limits of its abilities.
- Used in a sentence: That history assignment turned out to be a killer and took me forever to finish.
- Real-world examples: You might call a baseball game that goes into extra innings with a 2–2 score, a killer game. If you come down with a severe cold that keeps you in bed for several days, you could call it a killer cold.
- Used in a sentence: After living abroad for five years, Michelle came down with a killer case of homesickness.
Other Word Forms
- self-killer noun
Etymology
Origin of killer
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
“Complacency is a killer,” he told a crowd of about 50 last week at On the Kirb, an organic sports bar in the upmarket Houston neighborhood of Upper Kirby.
Instead of processing it on CODIS, they used another part of the DNA to search for potential relatives of the unknown killer in ancestry databases.
From Los Angeles Times
His older brother Billy has been seeking justice for years and believes there is enough evidence to identify the killer, saying it was "no ordinary murder".
From BBC
The white mask of the Ghostface killer has become a pop culture reference.
From Barron's
Author Michelle McNamara a decade ago helped revive interest in a serial killer who stalked parts of California in the 1970s and 1980s.
From Los Angeles Times
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
