customer
Americannoun
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a person who purchases goods or services from another; buyer; patron.
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Informal. a person one has to deal with.
a tough customer; a cool customer.
noun
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a person who buys
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informal a person with whom one has dealings
a cool customer
Etymology
Origin of customer
First recorded in 1400–50; late Middle English; custom + -er 1; compare Middle English customer “collector of customs,” from Anglo-French; Old French costumier, cognate with Medieval Latin custumārius; see customary
Explanation
A customer is anyone paying for a good or service. Without customers, businesses would go out of business. When you're paying for just about anything, you're a customer. People shopping at the grocery store, sitting in coffee shops, going to movies, and buying DVDs online are all customers. The point of advertising is to drum up new customers for a business. There's a cliché that "The customer is always right," which is obviously not true, but shows how businesses try to make customers happy. They'd better. Without customers, any business is in deep trouble.
Vocabulary lists containing customer
Business, List 1
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The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane
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Unit 17, Lesson 2
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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.
It would have required the state’s regulatory agency to consider the audits’ findings before agreeing to raise customer rates to cover even more wildfire prevention spending.
From Los Angeles Times • May 26, 2026
This led to supermarkets putting limits on how many eggs each customer could buy and both producers and retailers put prices up to offset their losses.
From BBC • May 24, 2026
Shraddha Surya, a 28-year-old product developer, said she has been a devoted customer of quick-commerce apps like Blinkit and Zepto for three years.
From The Wall Street Journal • May 23, 2026
In its earnings report earlier this month, Palantir Technologies claimed that it had done just that, making a custom replacement for its customer relations management software, a market where Salesforce is the biggest player.
From Barron's • May 22, 2026
Willingness to hire people with criminal records is greatest in construction or manufacturing—industries that require little customer contact—and weakest in retail trade and other service sector businesses.
From "The New Jim Crow" by Michelle Alexander
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.
