lawyer

Syllables: law·yerUK/ˈlɔːjə(ɹ)//ˈlɔɪ.ɚ/

lawyer noun: a professional person with a graduate law degree that qualifies for legal work (such as Juris Doctor).

Noun

lawyer (plural lawyers)

A professional person with a graduate law degree that qualifies for legal work (such as Juris Doctor)
A professional person qualified (as by a law degree or bar exam) and authorized to practice law as an attorney-at-law, solicitor, advocate, barrister or equivalent, i.e. represent parties in lawsuits or trials and give legal advice.
- His forefathers had been, as a rule, professional men—physicians and lawyers; his grandfather died under the walls of Chapultepec Castle while twisting a tourniquet for a cursing dragoon; an uncle remained indefinitely at Malvern Hill;[…].1907 August, Robert W[illiam] Chambers, chapter II, in The Younger Set, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, →OCLC
- Mr. Wells was a pleasant man of middle-age, with keen eyes, and the typical lawyer’s mouth.1920, Agatha Christie, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, London: Pan Books, published 1954, page 59
Synonyms:

advocate, attorney, counselor
(broadly) A legal layman who argues points of law.
(UK, colloquial) The burbot.
(UK, dialectal) The stem of a bramble.
A relative of the raspberry found in Australia and New Zealand, Rubus australis
- The species of Eugnomus are very partial to the lawyer (Rubus australis ) when in bloom.1881 April, George M. Thomson, “On the Fertilization of New Zealand Flowering Plants”, in Transactions and Proceedings of the New Zealand Institute, volume 13, page 250
- In the lawyer (Rubus australis) a considerable differentiation has taken place. All the alllies of this plant (such as the true roses, brambles, rasps, &c.), exhibit a strong development of epidermal structures in the form of hooks, spines, or hairs, but in none are these structures so perfect as...1885, New Zealand Journal of Science - Volume 2, page 417
Various species of Calamus, including Calamus australis, Calamus muelleri, Calamus obstruens, Calamus vitiensis, Calamus warburgii, and Calamus moti.
- Besides the bags and nets common throughout the continent, these tribes have water-bags, which they make of closely-plaited “lawyer” (Calamus Australis), and also of palm-leaf sewn with the sinews of animals.1886, Edward Micklethwaite Curr, The Australian Race, page 427
- The nest was a foot or two from the ground, and placed in a bunch of lawyer (Calamus ) canes.1901, Archibald James Campbell, Nests and Eggs of Australian Birds, page 267
A woody climbing rainforest vine, Flagellaria indica.
- The stems of the "lawyer vine" (Flagellaria indica), buz or buzi (W.), boz (E.), are used in house-building, tying fences, etc.2011, A. C. Haddon, W. H. R. Rivers, Reports of the Cambridge Anthropological Expedition to Torres Straits, page 89

Verb

lawyer (third-person singular simple present lawyers, present participle lawyering, simple past and past participle lawyered)

(informal, intransitive) To practice law.
(intransitive) To perform, or attempt to perform, the work of a lawyer.
(intransitive) To make legalistic arguments.
(informal, transitive) To barrage (a person) with questions in order to get them to admit something.
- You've been lawyered!

Proper noun capitalized: Lawyer

Lawyer

A male given name.

lawyer meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu

lawyer in Hindi

professional person with a graduate law degree that qualifies for legal work: वकील vakīl

lawyer in Tamil

professional person with a graduate law degree that qualifies for legal work: வழக்கறிஞர் vaḻakkaṟiñar

lawyer in Marathi

professional person with a graduate law degree that qualifies for legal work: वकील vakīl

lawyer in Urdu

professional person with a graduate law degree that qualifies for legal work: وَکِیل vakīl, قانُون دان qānūn dān

More languagesFewer languages

lawyer in Bengali: উকিল ukil, আইনজীবি ainjibi
lawyer in Telugu: న్యాయవాది nyāyavādi, వకీలు vakīlu, ప్లీడరు plīḍaru
lawyer in Malayalam: അഭിഭാഷകന് abhibhāṣakanŭ, വക്കീല് vakkīlŭ
lawyer in Kannada: ವಕೀಲ vakīla
lawyer in Punjabi: ਵਕੀਲ vakīl
lawyer in Gujarati: વકીલ vakīl
lawyer in Odia: ଓକିଲ
lawyer in Sinhala: නීතිඥයා nītignayā
lawyer in Assamese: উকিল ukil
lawyer in Nepali: वकिल, वकील, वकिललाई
lawyer in Pashto: قانوندان qānundān, قانونپوه qānunpoh
lawyer in Tagalog: mananaggol, abogado
lawyer in Arabic: مُحَامٍ muḥāmin, مُحَامِيَة muḥāmiya
lawyer in Malay: peguam, loyar, muhami
lawyer in Indonesian: pengacara
lawyer in Thai: ทนายความ tá-naai-kwaam, ทนาย tá-naai, นักกฎหมาย nák-gòt-mǎai
lawyer in Vietnamese: luật sư
lawyer in Myanmar: ရှေ့နေ hre.ne

Examples of lawyer in a sentence

A lawyer's time and advice are his stock in trade. [one of various versions of an aphorism in law]
In the lawyer (Rubus australis) a considerable differentiation has taken place.1885, New Zealand Journal of Science - Volume 2, page 417:
A plant that is excessively troublesome in the localities where the native vegetation has been least disturbed is the “lawyer” (Rubus australis).1915, John Henderson, P. Marshall, Percy Gates Morgan, The Geology and Mineral Resources of the Reefton Subdivision, Westport and North...
They were usually very neatly laid out under arching masses of the exasperating lawyer-palm vines ( Calamus moti and C. australis ), and consequently not too easy to examine.1910 October, Sidney Wm. Jackson, “Additional Notes on Tooth-billed Bower-Bird (Scenopaeetes dentirostris) of North Queensland”, in The...
Lawyer Vine (Calamus muelleri), also known as Hairy Mary and Wait-a-while, is actually a palm, that grows in long canes that loop and snake through the undergrowth.2014, Germaine Greer, White Beech: The Rainforest Years, page 171:

All 40 example sentences with lawyer

Synonyms of lawyer

1 more synonymsFewer synonyms

man of law

Antonyms

non-lawyer

All synonyms and antonyms of lawyer

Forms of lawyer

Noun
plural	lawyers
alternative form (obsolete)	lawer
Verb
third-person singular present	lawyers
present participle	lawyering
past participle	lawyered
past	lawyered

Plural of lawyer: lawyers

Origin of lawyer

From Middle English lawiere, lawier, lawer, equivalent to law + -yer.

Phrases with lawyer

Words that rhyme with lawyer

Questions about lawyer

What does lawyer mean?: Lawyer means a professional person with a graduate law degree that qualifies for legal work (such as Juris Doctor).
What is lawyer in Hindi?: Lawyer in Hindi is वकील (vakīl). See Lawyer meaning in Hindi.
How do you use lawyer in a sentence?: A lawyer's time and advice are his stock in trade. [one of various versions of an aphorism in law]
What part of speech is lawyer?: Lawyer can be a noun, a verb or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce lawyer?: Lawyer is pronounced /ˈlɔːjə(ɹ)/ (UK).
What is the plural of lawyer?: The plural of lawyer is lawyers.

Words near lawyer in the dictionary

Adapted from Wiktionary: lawyer (page history and authors); Lawyer (page history and authors); lawyer (Odia, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); lawyer (Nepali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license). 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.

Last updated: 2026-09-02

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-lawyer.ogg.

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