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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

floater.

A person who floats.

7 characters2 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/ˈfləʊtə/Received-Pronunciation/ˈfloʊtəɹ/General-American[-ɾəɹ]General-American
  1. A person who floats. A person who physically floats in a gas or liquid.

  2. A person who floats. A person who physically floats in a gas or liquid. A corpse floating in a body of water.

    slang
  3. A person who floats. A person without a fixed or lasting affiliation, position, or role. A person who frequently changes where they live; a drifter, a vagrant.

    figuratively
  4. A person who floats. A person without a fixed or lasting affiliation, position, or role. A person who frequently changes employment.

    figuratively
  5. A person who floats. A person without a fixed or lasting affiliation, position, or role. An employee of an organization who does not have fixed tasks to do but fills in wherever needed, usually when someone else is away; also, a short-term employee; a temporary, a temp.

    figuratively
  6. A person who floats. A person without a fixed or lasting affiliation, position, or role. An "extra" (male) guest at a party who is asked by the host to entertain the other (often female) guests.

    figuratively
  7. A person who floats. A person without a fixed or lasting affiliation, position, or role. A person who attaches themselves to a group of people, and who repeatedly shows up at group activities even though this is undesired by the group; a hanger-on.

    figuratively · slang
  8. A person who floats. A person without a fixed or lasting affiliation, position, or role. A voter who shifts their allegiance from one political party to another, especially (US) one whose vote can be illegally purchased.

    figuratively
  9. A person who floats. A person without a fixed or lasting affiliation, position, or role. A person who votes illegally in various electoral districts or polling places, either under a false voter registration or under the name of a properly registered voter who has not yet voted.

    US · figuratively
  10. A person who floats. A person without a fixed or lasting affiliation, position, or role. A person, such as a delegate to a convention or a member of a legislature, who represents an irregular constituency, such as one formed by a union of the voters of two counties neither of which has a number sufficient to be allowed one (or an extra) representative of its own.

    US · figuratively
  11. A person who floats. A person without a fixed or lasting affiliation, position, or role. A player not affiliated with a team.

    figuratively
  12. A thing which floats. A thing which physically floats in a gas or liquid. A river mussel (genus Anodonta).

  13. A thing which floats. A thing which physically floats in a gas or liquid. A small suet dumpling put into soup.

  14. A thing which floats. A thing which physically floats in a gas or liquid. A piece of faeces which floats.

    vulgar
    He left a floater in the toilet.
  15. A thing which floats. A thing which physically floats in a gas or liquid. A threadlike speck in the visual field which seems to move, possibly caused by degeneration of the vitreous humour of the eye.

  16. A thing which floats. A thing which physically floats in a gas or liquid. A ball that moves lightly through the air, as if floating; specifically (basketball), an early layup taken by a player moving towards the rim where, upon release, the ball floats in the air over the top of a defender before dropping softly into the hoop.

  17. A thing which floats. A thing which physically floats in a gas or liquid. Ellipsis of pie floater (“a meat pie served floating in a bowl of thick green pea soup”).

    Australia · abbreviation · alt-of · ellipsis
  18. A thing which floats. A thing which physically floats in a gas or liquid. A waterproof sandal.

    India
  19. A thing which floats. A thing which moves from place to place, as if floating. A mistake or misstep; a faux pas.

    dated · figuratively · slang
  20. A thing which floats. A thing which moves from place to place, as if floating. Clipping of floating rate bond.

    abbreviation · alt-of · clipping · figuratively
  21. A thing which floats. A thing which moves from place to place, as if floating. An insurance policy covering movable property at more than one location or which may be in transit.

    figuratively
  22. A thing which floats. A thing which moves from place to place, as if floating. A book circulated between prisoners which is not part of the official prison library.

    figuratively · slang
  23. A thing which floats. A thing which moves from place to place, as if floating. eye floater

    figuratively
  24. A thing which floats. A thing which moves from place to place, as if floating. A manoeuvre in which a surfer transitions above the unbroken face of a wave on to the lip, or on top of the breaking section of the wave.

    figuratively
  25. A thing which floats. A thing which moves from place to place, as if floating. A spinning delivery of the ball that travels in a high arched path.

    figuratively
  26. A thing which floats. A thing which moves from place to place, as if floating. A coin which does not spin when thrown in the air.

    figuratively
  27. A thing which floats. A thing which moves from place to place, as if floating. A criminal sentence which is suspended so long as the convicted person leaves an area.

    US · figuratively
  28. A thing which floats. A thing which moves from place to place, as if floating. A frame with space between the artwork and the frame itself.

    figuratively
Where this word comes from

From float + -er (suffix forming agent nouns). Compare Old English flota (“boat, ship", also "sailor, pirate”, literally “floater”), whence Middle English flote (“a fleet of ships", also, "a float, flotation device”).

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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.