cleaner
UK /ˈkliː.nə/ · US /ˈkli.nɚ/ noun
Also a form of clean
Forms cleaners
- noun A person whose occupation is to clean things, especially rooms, floors, and windows.
- noun A device that cleans, such as the vacuum cleaner.
- noun A substance used for cleaning; especially, one retailed for that purpose and meant for use on things other than one's own body.
- noun (in the plural) A professional laundry or dry cleaner (business). “I'll have to take this shirt to the cleaners.”
- noun (informal, idiomatic) A fixer; a person who disposes of bodies and evidence.
Synonyms
cleaning agent cleaning fluid cleansing agent cleanser dry cleaner
Etymology
Inherited from Middle English clener, clenere, equivalent to clean + -er (agent noun suffix).
Inherited from Middle English clener, clenner, clanner, clannere, from Old English clǣnra, clǣnre (“cleaner, purer, clearer”), from Proto-West Germanic *klainiʀō (“daintier, more delicate”), from Proto-Germanic *klainizô (“shinier, finer, more splendid”), equivalent to clean + -er.
Webster’s 1913
- noun One who, or that which, cleans.
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “cleaner”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details