suitor
Americannoun
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a man who courts or woos a woman.
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Law. a petitioner or plaintiff.
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a person who sues or petitions for anything.
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Informal. an individual who seeks to buy a business.
noun
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a man who courts a woman; wooer
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law a person who brings a suit in a court of law; plaintiff
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rare a person who makes a request or appeal for anything
Etymology
Origin of suitor
1250–1300; Middle English s ( e ) utor, suitour < Anglo-French < Latin secūtor, equivalent to secū-, variant stem of sequī to follow + -tor -tor
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.
After such a steep selloff in Brown-Forman’s stock, there is reason to believe it has become attractive to a suitor.
From MarketWatch • Mar. 26, 2026
Hoping to push Google to commit to a deal, they flirted with another suitor: Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook.
From The Wall Street Journal • Mar. 25, 2026
When her suitor mistakes the blood for an injury, it soon becomes clear that his expensive education was somewhat incomplete.
From Barron's • Mar. 4, 2026
Bernstein’s Harshita Rawat wrote Monday that she thought private equity would be the most likely suitor for PayPal in its entirety, in part due to the company’s “pristine balance sheet.”
From MarketWatch • Feb. 23, 2026
I became her official suitor without having to perform any superhuman tasks because, despite her awesome beauty and her innumerable virtues, Rosa had no other wooers.
From "The House of the Spirits: A Novel" by Isabel Allende
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.
