businessman
noun
Simple meaning
A man who works in trade, commerce or running a company.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
biznuhsmanSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ˈbɪznəsmæn
This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.
IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.
Definition
Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.
noun
A man in business, one who works at a commercial institution.
A person engaged in commercial or industrial business (especially an owner or executive)
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- B2 · Upper Intermediate (estimated)
- Frequency
- Moderately Common
- Typical Use
- Neutral / general English
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
This meaning: A man in business, one who works at a commercial institution.
Used this way, businessman is a reasonably familiar word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. It turns up most in business or professional contexts.
- Emotional tone
- Neutral
- Formality
- Neutral
- Intensity
- Not strongly marked
- How common
- Moderately common
- Connotation
- Matter-of-fact
- Usage feel
- Neutral and straightforward
Where it naturally appears
- Business/professional
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
More ways to use businessman
- “The businessman traveled frequently for meetings with clients.”noun
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Common Patterns and Combinations
How this word naturally appears with others.
Word Family
Related forms, grouped by how they connect.
Compound terms
Established multiword terms.
A very wealthy or powerful businessman.
A businessman who runs a business employing less than 100 people.
Related Words
Connected to the same idea, not synonyms.
- executivenoun
- entrepreneurnoun
- developernoun
- ownernoun
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What Does It Mean Here?
Words can change meaning depending on context.
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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.