boarder
Americannoun
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a person, especially a lodger, who is supplied with regular meals.
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a member of a boarding party.
noun
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a pupil who lives at school during term time
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a child who lives away from its parents and is cared for by a person or organization receiving payment
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another word for lodger
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a person who boards a ship, esp one who forces his way aboard in an attack
stand by to repel boarders
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informal a person who takes part in sailboarding or snowboarding
Etymology
Origin of boarder
Explanation
A boarder is someone who rents a room in someone's house. It can also be a student who lives and studies away from home at a boarding school. There are two main meanings of boarder, but they both involve staying somewhere away from home. A boarding school is a private school where students live as well as study. Those students are called boarders. Also, if someone rents a room of their house to guests, the guests are boarders. Holden Caulfield, the main character of "Catcher in the Rye," was a boarder; that is, until he got thrown out of Pencey Prep.
Vocabulary lists containing boarder
Commonly Confused Words, List 1
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The Circuit
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The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle
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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.
She met her future husband when she became a boarder at the prestigious Achimota School in the capital, Accra.
From BBC • Oct. 23, 2025
The experiment, published in the Science Advances journal, used levitating magnets to detect gravity on microscopic particles -- small enough to boarder on the quantum realm.
From Science Daily • Feb. 25, 2024
On the Libyan side, Ahmed Hamza, chairman of the National Human Rights Committee in Libya, a local rights group, said 150 migrants were transferred by Libyan boarder guards to shelters in the capital, Tripoli.
From Washington Times • Aug. 10, 2023
Toes gripping carefully applied wax, arms loose and eyes forward, these surfing experts convey the joy and freedom that even the most casual boogie boarder feels in the ocean.
From Los Angeles Times • Aug. 3, 2023
I wondered if Mrs. Croft would remember me; I wondered if she had a new boarder to sit with her on the bench each evening.
From "Interpreter of Maladies" by Jhumpa Lahiri
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.
