projector

American  

[pruh-jek-ter] / prəˈdʒɛk tər /

noun

• projectors
  plural

1. an apparatus for throwing an image on a screen, as a motion-picture projector or magic lantern.

2. a device for projecting a beam of light.

3. a person who forms projects or plans.

4. Archaic. a person who devises underhanded or unsound plans; schemer.

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projector British  

/ prəˈdʒɛktə /

noun

1. Full name: slide projector. an optical instrument that projects an enlarged image of individual slides onto a screen or wall

2. Full name: film projector, cine projector. an optical instrument in which a strip of film is wound past a lens at a fixed speed so that the frames can be viewed as a continuously moving sequence on a screen or wall

3. a device for projecting a light beam

4. a person who devises projects

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Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• projectors
  plural

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Etymology

Origin of projector

First recorded in 1590–1600; project + -or ²

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Explanation

A projector is a machine you use for showing movies or images on a screen. In the days before digital cameras, tourists would frequently take pictures with slide film that they could show their friends later with a projector. Today, most theaters use digital equipment to show movies, although a few are still filmed on actual film and require an old-fashioned projector. While these days a teacher might use a large television and a laptop to show the class an educational film, they would once have had to use a projector and a film strip. Projector comes from the verb project, "cast an image," from Latin roots pro-, "forward," and iacere, "to throw."

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

projector projectors

Launched in the U.S. in 1896, with the New York premiere of Thomas Edison’s Vitascope film projector, silent movies astonished audiences.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 10, 2026

Mastering this unusual system has proved a challenge but an exhilarating one, with the print moving at 180 feet per minute, twice the speed of a conventional projector.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 20, 2026

The projector returned to the museum a few months ago.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 20, 2026

Alternative methods for viewing the eclipse include using a solar telescope or making a pinhole projector.

From BBC ● Aug. 11, 2026

There was a church there and a saloon, and in back of the saloon an added-on frame shack building with a tattered movie screen and a battery-operated small film projector.

From This Side of Wild by Gary Paulsen

Now the Leicester Square cult cinema has secured the new lease with no break clause, offering it security so the "projectors will keep rolling for years to come".

From BBC ● Oct. 15, 2026

Examples include liquid-crystal panels used in projectors and optical chips found in telecommunications systems.

From Science Daily ● Sep. 18, 2026

Those unable to find glasses used other methods, including colanders as pinhole projectors to cast multiple images of the eclipse.

From BBC ● Aug. 13, 2026

It’s an admirable acknowledgement of those behind the scenes, slotting film reels into the Dryden’s 75-year-old projectors, summoning shimmering worlds before our eyes.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 10, 2026

He searched between all of his holographic projectors mounted in the catwalks above the stage, and under auditorium seats, and in the bandstand.

From "The Last Last-Day-of-Summer" by Lamar Giles

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