premier

UK/ˈpɹɛm.iː.ə/US/pɹɪˈmɪəɹ/

premier adjective: foremost; first or highest in quality or degree.

Adjective

premier (not comparable)

Foremost; first or highest in quality or degree.
- This failure, for a team associated with one of the premier Australian Rules Football teams with the longest of traditions, is truly enormous.2004, Philip Moore, Scouting an Anthropology of Sport, Anthropologica, Volume 46, Number 1, Canadian Anthropology Society, page 40
- If they′d followed the advice they had received more carefully, they would have paired up with John Fairfax Holdings, later Fairfax Media, Australia′s premier independent media company.2011, Kate Askew, Dot. Bomb Australia, Read How You Want, page 70
Most ancient; first to hold a specified status.
- PREMIER, a. This French word, which signifies first, is used by English Heralds to signify the most ancient Peer of any Degree by Creation; as Premier Baron, &c.[1777, Antoine Pyron du Marte, Mr. Porny, The Elements of Heraldry
- […]dau. of Lord Forbes, Premier Baron of Scotland (the Cumine family were of very ancient date[…])1882, Bernard Burke, A Genealogical and Heraldic History of the Landed Gentry of Great Britain & Ireland, page 1390

Noun

premier (plural premiers)

(UK, Westminster-system, UK parliament) The prime minister.
- Mr. Gladstone had literally no option. Not to coerce the Lords was to coerce the Commons to continue purchase in spite of their repeated votes for its abolition, and this the Premier had as little the power as the will to do.1871 July 29, “Our Tyrant”, The Spectator, Volume 303, Issues 9308-9315, page 910
(Australia, Canada, South Africa, UK, Westminster-system) The leader of a state or provincial government and cabinet.
- More surprising than the company′s activities and interests were those of the premier of Ontario, Mitchell Hepburn.1974, Irving M. Abella, On Strike; Six Key Labour Struggles in Canada, 1919-1949, page 96
- The major concern of most of the premiers who attended the 1887 conference was, as Macdonald well understood, to put pressure upoon Ottawa to amend the B.N.A. Act to increase the subsidies paid to the provinces by tying them to current population levels rather than those of 1860.1986, R. Kenneth Carty, National Politics and Community in Canada, page 116
Synonyms:

first minister
(non-Westminster) The government leader in a legislative congress or leader of a government-level administrative body; the head of government.
- This shows that our policy of strengthening friendly ties with Africa as developed by Chairman Mao Zedong and Premier Zhou Enlai is a correct one and that it has won popular support in Africa.1983, Guo Zhou, China & the World, Volume 4, Beijing Review, page 13
- Actual decision-making power in China resides in the state′s executive organs and in the CCP. At the national level the top government executive organ is the State Council, which is led by the premier.1998, The New Encyclopædia Britannica, volume 16, page 61
(slang) The first lieutenant or other second-in-command officer of a ship.

Synonyms:

first lieutenant, first mate
(Australia, sporting) The champion team of a particular season (especially as used in Australian rules football).

Verb

premier (third-person singular simple present premiers, present participle premiering, simple past and past participle premiered)

To perform, display or exhibit for the first time.
- The composer invited all his friends when they premiered the movie he orchestrated, we got to see it before anyone but the crew.
- Beethoven at first promised Schuppanzigh the right to premier Opus 127, but Linke, cellist in Schuppanzigh′s Quartet, had also received Beethoven′s permission to premier the work at a special benefit concert for himself.1998, John Herschel Baron, Intimate Music: A History of the Idea of Chamber Music, page 231
To govern in the role of premier.

premier meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu

premier in Hindi

प्रीमियर

premier in Tamil

பிரதமர், முதலாட்டம்

premier in Marathi

प्रीमियर

premier in Urdu

مقدم

More languagesFewer languages

premier in Bengali: প্রধানমন্ত্রী, প্রথম ব্যক্তি, প্রধান ব্যক্তি, প্রধান
premier in Telugu: ప్రీమియర్
premier in Malayalam: മുഖ്യമന്ത്രി, പ്രധാനി, ഒന്നാമത്തെ, പ്രധാനമായ
premier in Kannada: ಪ್ರಧಾನಮಂತ್ರಿ, ಪ್ರಧಾನಸಚಿವ, ಪ್ರಧಾನಿ, ಮೊದಲಿಗ
premier in Punjabi: ਪ੍ਰੀਮੀਅਰ
premier in Gujarati: પ્રીમિયર
premier in Odia: ପ୍ରିମିଯ଼ର, ପ୍ରିମିଯ଼ର୍
premier in Nepali: प्रिमियर, प्रीमियर, प्रिमिअर

Examples of premier in a sentence

South Africa′s golfing greats battle it out on one of the country′s premier courses.2011, Pippa de Bruyn, Keith Bain, Frommer′s South Africa, 7th edition, unnumbered page:
" It will be seen from the autograph appended [...] He was the first to arrive, but it was to his coachman that he owed it that he became the premier Duke of France.1890, William Thomas Stead, The Review of Reviews, page 327:
John Forrest had dominated the fledgling state of Western Australia, serving as premier for the previous decade.2007, Patrick Moray Weller, Cabinet Government in Australia, 1901-2006: Practice, Principles, Performance, page 1:
In 1890 it was South Australian Premier Charles Cameron Kingston who first proposed a system of compulsory conciliation and arbitration to deal with industrial unrest.2009, Andrew Stewart, edited by John Spoehr, Chapter 16: Industrial Relations: State of South Australia: From Crisis to Prosperity?, page...

All 39 example sentences with premier

Synonyms of premier

Forms of premier

Noun
plural	premiers
Verb
third-person singular present	premiers
present participle	premiering
past participle	premiered
past	premiered

Past tense of premier: premiered

Plural of premier: premiers

Origin of premier

Borrowed from Middle French premier (adjective), from Latin prīmārius. Doublet of primary.

Words formed from premier

Phrases with premier

Words that rhyme with premier

48 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about premier

What does premier mean?: Premier means foremost; first or highest in quality or degree.
What is premier in Hindi?: Premier in Hindi is प्रीमियर. See Premier meaning in Hindi.
How do you use premier in a sentence?: South Africa′s golfing greats battle it out on one of the country′s premier courses.
What part of speech is premier?: Premier can be an adjective, a noun or a verb.
How do you pronounce premier?: Premier is pronounced /ˈpɹɛm.iː.ə/ (UK).

Words near premier in the dictionary

Adapted from Wiktionary: premier (page history and authors); premier (Hindi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); premier (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); premier (Marathi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); premier (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); premier (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); premier (Telugu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); premier (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); premier (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); premier (Punjabi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); premier (Gujarati, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); premier (Odia, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); premier (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-ca-premier.opus, en-au-premier.ogg.

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