duster

American  

[duhs-ter] / ˈdʌs tər /

noun

1. a person or thing that removes dust: the rags I use as dusters for the furniture.

   a housekeeper who’s a meticulous duster;

   the rags I use as dusters for the furniture.

2. a person or thing that applies dust, powder, etc.: a new pink duster for her lavender-scented body powder.

   a team of dusters who use magnetic powder to detect fingerprints;

   a new pink duster for her lavender-scented body powder.

3. a container with a perforated lid for sprinkling dust, powder, etc.: a decorative cake topping made with a stencil and a sugar duster.

   a duster for shaking insecticide onto your rose bushes;

   a decorative cake topping made with a stencil and a sugar duster.

4. crop duster.

   Until this wind dies down, our dusters will be grounded.

5. a lightweight housecoat.

   She was the perfect grandmother, always in a flowered duster and always with a jar full of cookies.

6. a long, light overgarment, worn to protect one’s clothing from dust.

   On display is a man’s brown canvas duster, circa 1910, commonly worn in the early days of open automobiles.

7. a calf-length cardigan or coat for women that is loose-fitting and often without buttons or other fasteners.

   She rocks it in a breezy chambray duster and buttercup-yellow heels.

8. Meteorology. dust storm.

   The suddenness with which these dusters appear can be very unnerving.

9. Also called dust-off pitch.  Baseball. a pitched ball that travels so far inside as it crosses the plate that the batter is forced to drop to the ground so as not to be hit by the ball.

   That’s the second duster Hernandez has thrown in this series, so the umpire’s warning comes as no surprise.

10. dry hole.

    They were so sure they’d strike oil, but I knew it was going to be a duster.

11. Military. Duster, a self-propelled U.S. antiaircraft gun developed in the 1950s, armed with a twin 40 mm cannon.

    The last time an Air Defense Artillery class fired the Duster in training was in 1988.

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duster British  

/ ˈdʌstə /

noun

1. US name: dust cloth.  a cloth used for dusting furniture, etc

2. a machine for blowing out dust over trees or crops

3. a person or thing that dusts

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Etymology

Origin of duster

First recorded in 1570–80; dust + -er ¹

Example Sentences

In Kern County: Mistaken for a government agent by foreign spies, Roger Thornhill, played by Cary Grant, is chased across a barren field in Indiana by a crop duster in “North by Northwest.”

From The Wall Street Journal • Feb. 16, 2026

Don’t use a feather duster or anything similar that stirs up dust, Filippelli said.

From Seattle Times • Apr. 15, 2024

She was dressed in a lacy white duster over slacks and T-shirt and her shoes were not meant for hiking.

From Los Angeles Times • Aug. 25, 2023

Hankey even hired a crop duster to fly over half of his 30 acres to test whether the plane would move more pollen around in the air and improve fertilization.

From Reuters • Dec. 21, 2022

Everybody knew that underneath Mama’s linen duster she had on mourning clothes, but she looked smart and stylish all the same.

From "Cold Sassy Tree" by Olive Ann Burns

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