warrior
Americannoun
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warriors
plural
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a person engaged or experienced in warfare; soldier.
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a person who shows or has shown great vigor, courage, or aggressiveness, as in politics or athletics.
noun
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of warrior
First recorded in 1250–1300; Middle English werreieor, from Old North French; equivalent to war 1 + -or 2
Compare meaning
How does warrior compare to similar and commonly confused words? Explore the most common comparisons:
Explanation
Although logically linked with someone engaged in war, a warrior can be anyone who fights the good fight, whether in politics, on the job, or just as a "weekend warrior" trying to accomplish multiple tasks during off-hours at home. As the Old French guerre meant "war," it led to the word guerreor for someone who wages war. This eventually morphed into the word we know as warrior. The word can also refer to someone fighting a philosophical or political war. Author Carlos Castandeda said, "Nobody is born a warrior, in exactly the same way that nobody is born an average man. We make ourselves into one or the other.” After ridding the kitchen of ants, you felt like a proud warrior.
Vocabulary lists containing warrior
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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:
Yet the image of the male Viking warrior stubbornly lingers, drawing crowds while also haunting the galleries like a restless specter.
From Science Daily ● Sep. 23, 2026
Xavier, a vile keyboard warrior, thinks he might have hooked a politician in rural Murphy, Texas.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 23, 2026
She and the president also have access to A.I., which they can ask to generate endless images of him as a warrior, god, rock star or other powerful character.
From Salon ● Sep. 9, 2026
From the new world, a bird-shaped jar wears women’s attire from the Moche culture and a bottle is emblazoned with a fearsome fox warrior.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 4, 2026
The calendar had a picture of a colorful Aztec warrior standing guard over an Aztec princess whose eyes were closed; both were dressed in plumed and colorful costumes.
From "Breaking Through" by Francisco Jiménez
Here we see the real history butting up against the expected fantasy of Norse legends, warriors and gods.
From Science Daily ● Sep. 23, 2026
“Valkyrie” explores as well how all these mortal lives ran in parallel to those of supernatural women—figures that included goddesses, the mysterious Norns and the mythic warriors of the book’s title.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 14, 2026
He also chose a hairstyle patterned after the Mandinka warriors of West Africa — which has been commonly mistaken for a mohawk.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 9, 2026
As twilight settled on a hillside by the river near the eastern Ukrainian front, two soldiers exchanged wedding vows during a Slavic ritual honouring ancestors and fallen warriors.
From Barron's ● Sep. 2, 2026
He wasn’t sure if he was managing to lose the warriors or get himself more lost.
From "Beasts of Prey" by Ayana Gray
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.
