Word.ws English Dictionary

BDFL

BDFL is the initialism of benevolent dictator for life.

Meaning of benevolent dictator for life

Noun

benevolent dictator for life (plural benevolent dictators for life)

  1. (humorous) The leader of an open-source software project, typically project founders, who retains the final say in disputes or arguments within the community.

Forms of BDFL

pluralBDFLs

Questions about BDFL

What is BDFL the initialism of?
BDFL is the initialism of benevolent dictator for life.

Words near BDFL in the dictionary

  1. bdellourids
  2. bdelygmia
  3. BDEs
  4. BDF
  5. Bdf.
  6. BDFL
  7. BDFLs
  8. BDFs
  9. bdft
  10. BDI
  11. bdl

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: BDFL (page history and authors); benevolent dictator for life (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “BDFL.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/bdfl. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.