subscriber
Americannoun
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subscribers
plural
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a person, company, etc., that subscribes, as to a publication or concert series.
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a homeowner, apartment dweller, business, etc., that pays a monthly charge to be connected to a television cable service.
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a person who promises to donate a sum of money, purchase stock, etc.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of subscriber
Explanation
A subscriber is someone who supports a cause, philosophy, or an actual service, often through paying money. For example, a subscriber to a streaming service may pay a monthly fee to watch the provider's television shows and movies. The word subscriber comes from the Latin roots sub, meaning "under," and scrib, meaning "write." So subscribers can be thought of as those who sign their names at the bottom of a contract — either literally or figuratively. Magazine subscribers literally sign a contract to pay a monthly fee to get the latest issues delivered to them. But subscribers may also just be people who strongly agree with or adopt a philosophy or lifestyle, figuratively "signing on."
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.
See Examples For:
Circuit Court of Appeals, but in April 2025, a divided three-judge panel affirmed the dismissal, agreeing with the district court that Salazar’s newsletter subscription didn’t make him a subscriber under the law.
From Slate ● Oct. 17, 2026
Netflix last conducted major layoffs in 2022 after the streamer reported subscriber losses for the first time in more than a decade.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 9, 2026
Harned noted that Starlink’s broadband subscriber base is expected to double in 2026, extending its streak to five years.
From MarketWatch ● Sep. 28, 2026
On Alphabet’s fourth-quarter 2025 earnings call, Chief Executive Sundar Pichai said subscriber growth was the strongest since Sunday Ticket came to YouTube.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 13, 2026
For roughly $100 a year he became a subscriber to 10-K Wizard.
From "The Big Short" by Michael Lewis
Now, Argon, which Google says outperforms other frontier models on many benchmarks, is available for developers, enterprises, and some paid subscribers, priced at $2 per million input tokens and $10 per million output tokens.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 14, 2026
The last major redundancy round at Netflix was in 2022, when it cut about 450 jobs after losing subscribers for the first time in more than a decade.
From BBC ● Oct. 14, 2026
Wall Street tracks Starlink subscribers to help with financial projections.
From Barron's ● Oct. 14, 2026
UnitedHealth Group, Humana and CVS Health subsidiary Aetna are among those exiting markets or tweaking their coverage offerings as they try to protect profit margins instead of pushing for growth in new subscribers, analysts said.
From MarketWatch ● Oct. 9, 2026
Our switchboards have only enough jacks and plugs for Bell subscribers who live here in Washington.
From "The Brightwood Code" by Monica Hesse
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Get a wordDefinitions 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.
