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informer

noun

Simple meaning

Someone who tells authorities about improper or illegal activity.

Pronunciation

Say it like this:

ihnfawrmer

Say the bold part a little louder.

US device voice
IPA pronunciation (US)

ɪnˈfɔɹmɚ

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.

Word Review

Definition

Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.

noun

  1. One who informs someone else about something.

  2. A person who tells authorities about improper or illegal activity.

  3. One who informs, animates, or inspires.

  4. One who reveals confidential information in return for money

Word at a Glance

Difficulty
C2 · Proficient (estimated)
Frequency
Uncommon

Word Aura™

How this word commonly comes across.

Aura for this meaning

This meaning: One who informs someone else about something.

Used this way, informer is a reasonably familiar word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. It usually sounds natural in a wide range of settings.

Emotional tone
Neutral
Formality
Neutral
Intensity
Not strongly marked
How common
Moderately common
Connotation
Matter-of-fact
Usage feel
Neutral and straightforward

Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.

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Common Patterns and Combinations

How this word naturally appears with others.

common informerpolice informerturn informergovernment informerhouston informerpaid informerfbi informerinformer privilege

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Word Family

Related forms, grouped by how they connect.

Inflected forms

Grammatical variations of the same word.

  • informverbBase word

    Impart knowledge of some fact, state of affairs, or event to.

Word family

Words built from the same root.

  • informationnounDerived noun

    A message received and understood.

  • informaladjectiveDerived adjective

    Not formal.

  • informallyadverbDerived adverb

    Without formality.

Related words

Connected by subject or meaning, not by word formation.

  • informer's privilegenounRelated term

    The right of the government to refuse to reveal the identity of an informer.

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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.