a person who operates a machine, instrument, etc, esp a person who makes connections on a telephone switchboard or at an exchange a person who owns or operates an industrial or commercial establishment a speculator, esp one who operates on currency or stock markets a person who manipulates affairs and other people any symbol, term, letter, etc, used to indicate or express a specific operation or process, such as Δ (the differential operator)
WordReference Random House Learner's Dictionary of American English © 2026
op•er•a•tor /ˈɑpəˌreɪtɚ/USA pronunciation
n. [countable]
WordReference Random House Unabridged Dictionary of American English © 2026- a person who operates a machine or apparatus, esp. a telephone switchboard.
- a person who manages an industrial establishment or a business:a hotel operator.
- Informal Termsa person who accomplishes his or her purposes by cleverness or in slightly dishonest ways:He's a smooth operator.
op•er•a•tor
(op′ə rā′tər),USA pronunciation n.
- a person who operates a machine, apparatus, or the like:a telegraph operator.
- Telecommunicationsa person who operates a telephone switchboard, esp. for a telephone company.
- a person who manages a working or industrial establishment, enterprise, or system:the operators of a mine.
- a person who trades in securities, esp. speculatively or on a large scale.
- a person who performs a surgical operation;
a surgeon. - Mathematics
- a symbol for expressing a mathematical operation.
- a function, esp. one transforming a function, set, etc., into another:a differential operator.
- Informal Terms
- a person who accomplishes his or her purposes by devious means;
faker;
fraud. - a person who is adroit at overcoming, avoiding, or evading difficulties, regulations, or restrictions.
- a person who is extremely successful with or smoothly persuasive to members of the opposite sex.
- a person who accomplishes his or her purposes by devious means;
- Geneticsa segment of DNA that interacts with a regulatory molecule, preventing transcription of the adjacent region.
- Late Latin, equivalent. to operā(rī) to work, effect (see operate) + Latin -tor -tor
- 1590–1600
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