projector

American  

[pruh-jek-ter] / prəˈdʒɛk tər /

noun

projectors plural

1. an apparatus for throwing an image on a screen, as a motion-picture projector or magic lantern.

2. a device for projecting a beam of light.

3. a person who forms projects or plans.

4. Archaic. a person who devises underhanded or unsound plans; schemer.

---

projector British  

/ prəˈdʒɛktə /

noun

1. Full name: slide projector.  an optical instrument that projects an enlarged image of individual slides onto a screen or wall

2. Full name: film projector.   cine projector.  an optical instrument in which a strip of film is wound past a lens at a fixed speed so that the frames can be viewed as a continuously moving sequence on a screen or wall

3. a device for projecting a light beam

4. a person who devises projects

---

Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• projectors
  plural

Etymology

Origin of projector

First recorded in 1590–1600; project + -or ²

Explanation

A projector is a machine you use for showing movies or images on a screen. In the days before digital cameras, tourists would frequently take pictures with slide film that they could show their friends later with a projector. Today, most theaters use digital equipment to show movies, although a few are still filmed on actual film and require an old-fashioned projector. While these days a teacher might use a large television and a laptop to show the class an educational film, they would once have had to use a projector and a film strip. Projector comes from the verb project, "cast an image," from Latin roots pro-, "forward," and iacere, "to throw."

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

projector projectors

Georgia Hallgalley and Jake Hawker say they will have a projector showing the football at their wedding reception in Guildford to avoid guests missing out on the big game.

From BBC ● Jul. 10, 2026

Footage of giant yellow black-eyed Susan flowers beams onto the wall from one projector, intersecting with video of swaying plants from another.

From Los Angeles Times ● May 27, 2026

Elsewhere on the first floor, there is a magnificent movie room that is adorned in red velvet and boasts a fireplace and large projector.

From MarketWatch ● Apr. 17, 2026

In his downtime he would travel by horse and buggy across Pennsylvania and neighboring states with what he called his "exhibition": a new-fangled Edison phonograph, a magic lantern slide projector and later on, movies.

From Barron's ● Apr. 13, 2026

Before us looms the theater room’s giant Cube, a four-sided projector screen with one side pointed toward each block of seats.

From "Legend" by Marie Lu

In the future, displays and projectors based on this technology could become so compact that they are nearly invisible when integrated into wearable devices, from eyeglass frames to contact lenses.

From Science Daily ● Mar. 4, 2026

The only physical elements on display are six film projectors and the celluloid that contains frames of unreleased footage, which are shown on screens of different sizes around the room.

From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 23, 2026

All of our projectors and lasers, costumes and aerial equipment have been locked inside the building.

From BBC ● Feb. 9, 2026

Last year, Google sued the anonymous operators of a network of more than 10 million internet-connected televisions, tablets and projectors, saying they had secretly pre-installed residential proxy software on them.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 28, 2026

Turning, I saw the shimmering image of the rock, thrown up by multiple projectors mounted to the surrounding mountain.

From "Glitch" by Laura Martin