developer

American  

[dih-vel-uh-per] / dɪˈvɛl ə pər /

noun

1. a person or thing that develops or innovates.

   a software developer.

2. Photography. a reducing agent or solution for developing a film or the like.

3. a person who invests in and develops the urban or suburban potentialities of real estate, especially by subdividing the land into home sites and then building houses and selling them.

4. Shipbuilding. a person who lays out at full size the lines of a vessel and prepares templates from them.

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developer British  

/ dɪˈvɛləpə /

noun

1. a person or thing that develops something, esp a person who develops property

2. photog a solution of a chemical reducing agent that converts the latent image recorded in the emulsion of a film or paper into a visible image

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Etymology

Origin of developer

First recorded in 1825–35; develop + -er ¹

Example Sentences

The game design award went to Tonda Ros, the solo developer behind puzzle adventure Blue Prince.

From BBC • Apr. 17, 2026

ChatGPT developer OpenAI has already struck a multibillion-dollar agreement to buy computing capacity from Cerebras, according to The Wall Street Journal.

From Barron's • Apr. 17, 2026

The Philippine government asked the developer of the MTerra Solar project, in which infrastructure investor Actis owns a stake, about building more solar capacity.

From The Wall Street Journal • Apr. 16, 2026

Her focus is the West Valley, which has emerged as a premier destination for AI data center development—and where she has become the go-to developer and global capital partners staking their claim in the desert.

From MarketWatch • Apr. 15, 2026

In Georgia, he was the kind of web developer who made money, until he got laid off the day before Christmas.

From "What If It's Us" by Becky Albertalli and Adam Silvera

Related Words

• builder
• planner