worker

American  

[wur-ker] / ˈwɜr kər /

noun

• workers
  plural

1. a person or thing that works.

2. a laborer or employee.

   steel workers.

3. a person engaged in a particular field, activity, or cause.

   a worker in psychological research; a worker for the Republican Party.

4. Entomology.

   1. a member of a caste of sexually underdeveloped, nonreproductive bees, specialized to collect food and maintain the hive.

   2. a similar member of a specialized caste of ants, termites, or wasps.

5. Printing. one of a set of electrotyped plates used to print from (contrasted with molder).

6. any of several rollers covered with card clothing that work in combination with the stripper rollers and the cylinder in the carding of fibers.

---

worker British  

/ ˈwɜːkə /

noun

1. a person or thing that works, usually at a specific job

   a good worker

   a research worker

2. an employee in an organization, as opposed to an employer or manager

3. a manual labourer or other employee working in a manufacturing or other industry

4. any other member of the working class

5. a sterile female member of a colony of bees, ants, or wasps that forages for food, cares for the larvae, etc

---

Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• nonworker
  noun
• subworker
  noun
• workerless
  adjective

Inflected Forms

Nouns

• workers
  plural

Etymology

Origin of worker

First recorded in 1300–50, worker is from the Middle English word werker, worcher. See work, -er ¹

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

worker workers

Then, on the afternoon the father and son were due to meet, a social worker approached Chris.

From BBC ● Oct. 10, 2026

"Instead, because of the company's shortcomings, a worker has sadly and unnecessarily been left paralysed."

From BBC ● Oct. 10, 2026

A worker might walk 20,000 steps a shift.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 9, 2026

"I'm in shock right now and haven't been able to contact my family," Luis Poveda, a factory worker in Santiago de Veraguas, another city in central Panama, told AFP.

From Barron's ● Oct. 9, 2026

The boy told his aunt and uncle what the social worker had said.

From "Not Nothing" by Gayle Forman

In Long Beach, cars lined up Saturday at a Peninsula parking lot as fire department workers loaded sandbags into trunks.

From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 10, 2026

In contrast to their fierce opposition around the U.S. to workers being classified as employees, Uber and Lyft haven’t fought the unionization push.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 10, 2026

AFP reporters travelling from Pensacola to nearby Destin saw relatively minor damage, with electricity workers repairing power lines along mostly clear roads.

From Barron's ● Oct. 10, 2026

Not all workers and business have adapted to the same degree.

From BBC ● Oct. 9, 2026

The master clearly had no intention to, and I was already beginning to realize he wanted no kinship among his workers, so I knew they wouldn’t, either.

From "Flying Through Water" by Mamle Wolo

Related Words

• employee
• laborer
• staff