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applicant

applicants

An applicant is someone who signs up or applies for something. A job applicant for example, often fills out a form and then interviews for the position she hopes to get.

When you submit your college application to a school you'd like to attend, you are an applicant to that school. Other kinds of applicants are job candidates and scholarship hopefuls. To apply is to put in for or request entry to something, and the root of both apply and applicant is the Old French aploiier, "apply, use, or attach," from the Latin applicare, "attach to, join, or connect."

Definitions of applicant
  1. noun
    a person who requests or seeks something such as assistance or employment or admission
    synonyms: applier
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    types:
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    aspirant, aspirer, hopeful, wannabe, wannabee
    an ambitious and aspiring young person
    bidder
    someone who makes an offer
    claimant
    someone who claims a benefit or right or title
    job candidate
    an applicant who is being considered for a job
    material
    a person judged suitable for admission or employment
    petitioner, requester, suppliant, supplicant
    one praying humbly for something
    possible
    an applicant who might be suitable
    probable
    an applicant likely to be chosen
    submitter
    someone who submits something (as an application for a job or a manuscript for publication etc.) for the judgment of others
    legacy
    an applicant to an educational institution who is given special preference because a parent or relative attended that institution
    besieger
    an energetic petitioner
    postulant
    one submitting a request or application especially one seeking admission into a religious order
    Pretender
    a claimant to the throne or to the office of ruler (usually without just title)
    canvasser, solicitor
    a petitioner who solicits contributions or trade or votes
    type of:
    individual, mortal, person, somebody, someone, soul
    a human being
DISCLAIMER: These example sentences appear in various news sources and books to reflect the usage of the word ‘applicant'. Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Vocabulary.com or its editors. Send us feedback
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