dreamer
Americannoun
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a person who dreams.
The dream provides insights into the interior life of the dreamer, or so say many psychotherapists.
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a person who lives in a world of fantasy; one who is impractical and unrealistic.
The phrase "economically illiterate" has long been used to smear leftists as unrealistic utopian dreamers.
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a person whose ideas or projects are considered audacious or highly speculative; visionary.
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., was considered a dreamer—and what a wonderful dream it is!
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Usually Dreamer Sometimes DREAMer a person who qualifies for DACA or the Dream Act.
noun
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a person who dreams habitually
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a person who lives in or escapes to a world of fantasy or illusion; escapist
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archaic a prophet; visionary
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of dreamer
First recorded in 1250–1300; dreamer def. 4 first recorded in 2010–15; Middle English; see dream, -er 1 ( def. )
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.
With “Disclosure Day,” it’s clear that this unprecedented, Earth-shattering event brought oft-pondered questions about empathy and humanism back to the forefront for cinema’s great dreamer.
From Salon • Jun. 13, 2026
That night the Mexican actor was nominated for his performance as immigrant dreamer Manny Torres in “Babylon,” a 1920s-set dramedy about Hollywood mythmaking and excess.
From Los Angeles Times • May 12, 2026
So it is all the more affecting that for this charming last novel, he left us with a dreamer.
From The Wall Street Journal • Feb. 20, 2026
British journalist William Pike, who interviewed Museveni in 1984, described a well-admired man with a "faraway look in his eyes as he spoke, the look of a dreamer, a revolutionary".
From Barron's • Jan. 12, 2026
He—Strange the dreamer, junior librarian—had marched into the Chrysopoesium, brandishing a book of fairy tales, and presumed to share his insights on the deepest mystery of alchemy.
From "Strange the Dreamer" by Laini Taylor
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.
