apprentice
Americannoun
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a person who works for another in order to learn a trade.
an apprentice to a plumber.
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History/Historical. a person legally bound through indenture to a master craftsman in order to learn a trade.
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a learner; novice; tyro.
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U.S. Navy. an enlisted person receiving specialized training.
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a jockey with less than one year's experience who has won fewer than 40 races.
verb (used with object)
verb (used without object)
noun
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someone who works for a skilled or qualified person in order to learn a trade or profession, esp for a recognized period
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any beginner or novice
verb
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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apprenticesimple
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apprenticessimple
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have apprenticedperfect
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has apprenticedperfect
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am apprenticingprogressive
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are apprenticingprogressive
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is apprenticingprogressive
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have been apprenticingperfect progressive
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has been apprenticingperfect progressive
Past
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apprenticedsimple
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had apprenticedperfect
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was apprenticingprogressive
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were apprenticingprogressive
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had been apprenticingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of apprentice
First recorded in 1300–50; Middle English ap(p)rentis, from Anglo-French, Old French ap(p)rentiz, from unattested Vulgar Latin apprenditīcius, equivalent to unattested apprendit(us) (for Latin apprehēnsus; see apprehensible) + Latin -īcius suffix forming adjectives from past participles, here nominalized
Explanation
An apprentice is someone who learns a trade. An apprentice farmer is paid very little but has the chance to learn farming by watching and doing. In the old days, becoming an apprentice was the only way to get into many lines of work. Nowadays we think of it more in terms of trades — butchers, bakers, bricklayers, etc. If you do the same thing in an office setting, it's usually called an internship, but the idea is the same — learning by watching an expert. The word can be used as either a noun or verb: You are an apprentice, but you also can apprentice to the barber down the street.
Vocabulary lists containing apprentice
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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.
See Examples For:
Christine is only slightly more experienced, no longer an atelier apprentice, but is just beginning to prove herself, constructing her first garment entirely on her own.
From Salon ● Jun. 29, 2026
He worked as an apprentice in a machine shop.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 19, 2026
"Does it really sound like the president of the United States to run a televised program for who would be his next apprentice?"
From Barron's ● Jun. 18, 2026
In the Season 3 finale, the gunslinging warrior Din Djarin officially adopted his Force-sensitive charge, whose full name then became Din Grogu, and took him on as a proper Mandalorian apprentice.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 21, 2026
“I be a fine midwife’s apprentice now. I know about babies and birthing, singing songs and cooking chickens, crying and laughing and reading.”
From "The Midwife's Apprentice" by Karen Cushman
Tolman's point highlights an important question hanging over how trade apprentices are being taught today, as technology plays an increasingly bigger role.
From BBC ● Jul. 20, 2026
His scammers are hustlers and apprentices with lots of free time on their hands, freelancing in an informal economy of deception held together by cellphones and copied scripts.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 14, 2026
Overall, Bloomberg said its latest spending will support these sorts of efforts in half a dozen states, including classroom renovations and paid work stipends for student apprentices.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 6, 2026
BAE Systems said it had "rigorous safeguarding procedures to support and protect apprentices".
From BBC ● May 5, 2026
“If you’ve been here then you probably haven’t heard that Moreau is free. I think one of his other apprentices was using an illusion to take his place.”
From "Amari and the Night Brothers" by B.B. Alston
The younger Angel played sax in the family band, went to barber college in Pasadena, apprenticed in Williams, then came home in 1950 to take over his father’s old shop along Route 66.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 12, 2026
Samuel Slater, born in 1768 into a farming family in Derbyshire, England, was apprenticed at age 14 to the owner of a cotton mill that was using the novel Arkwright water frame.
From Barron's ● Jan. 28, 2026
Celebrities in the space, such as Frank Oz, apprenticed at Fairyland, and Metz continues to run multiple shows per day, both revivals and original creations.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 21, 2026
He studied at what is now known as the Institute of Culinary Education in New York, interned at Alps Salami in Queens and apprenticed with butchers in Tuscany.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 24, 2025
With an inheritance of £100 he was sent to London to be apprenticed to the artist Sir Peter Lely.
From "The Scientists" by John Gribbin
The boys’ father started his life in a Lower East Side tenement before apprenticing as a lawyer.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 27, 2026
Some say she has been apprenticing as a cobbler in the Italian countryside; others, that she’s formed an ice cave—and won the trust of indigenous penguin tribes—in Antarctica.
From Slate ● May 25, 2024
Chiarello started apprenticing in restaurants at only 14 and then attended the Culinary Institute of America in New York, where he graduated in 1982 and went on to study and work in restaurants in Florida.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 9, 2023
By the next year, she was studying at Tokyo University of the Arts and apprenticing at Handa Kyuseido, a relative newcomer in the multigenerational-family conservator field.
From Seattle Times ● Sep. 22, 2023
Mahmoud wanted Mohammed, and all of his sons, working on dry land, so Mohammed spent his early teenage years as a craftsman, laying brick and apprenticing for an ironsmith.
From "Zeitoun" by Dave Eggers
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.
