cleaner

Pluralcleaners

1. 1
   nouncountable

   Someone employed to do cleaning, particularly of rooms, floors, and windows in buildings.

   The hotel employs several cleaners for its hundreds of guest rooms.

   A cleaner comes to scrub the storefront windows every spring.

   Similarjanitor, custodian, housekeeper

   Note

   The job could be much wider than its name. J. Pelham Maitland's "Locomotive Working on Sussex Branches Fifty Years Ago" (1952) recalls a railway cleaner who worked through the night. He coaled the engine and lit it up as well as cleaning it, so it was ready for the next morning's run. The title named one task, while the work took in whatever kept the machine going.

2. 2
   nouncountable or uncountable

   A substance used for cleaning, especially one sold for that purpose and meant for use on objects rather than the body.

   The bottle of cleaner warned against mixing it with bleach.

   Industrial cleaners can strip paint as easily as they lift dirt.

   Similarcleanser, detergent

3. 3
   nouncountable

   A piece of equipment that removes dirt or similar unwanted material, such as a vacuum cleaner.

   The robotic cleaner navigated around the furniture on its own.

   He emptied the cleaner's dust container after vacuuming the stairs.

   Similarvacuum

4. 4
   adjective

   Comparative form of clean.

   The filtered water tasted cleaner than the water from the tap.

   Mountain air feels cleaner than the air downtown.

   Note

   The comparative is the older word. It goes back to Old English clǣnra, "purer, clearer", while the noun for a person who cleans was formed later from clean and the agent suffix. They are two words that happen to share a spelling. The adjective compares every sense of clean: cleaner water, a cleaner victory, a cleaner climb.

5. 5
   nouncountableplural

   A business that launders or dry-cleans clothing and other items for paying customers.

   She picked up her coat from the cleaner before the trip.

   Several cleaners in town now offer same-day service.

   Similarlaundry

   Note

   The business almost always goes by its plural, with the: you take a shirt to the cleaners, much as you go to the baker's. The plural names a place where clothes are sent, not anyone who works there, and that keeps it apart from the person who cleans. Hear "the cleaners" as a destination for laundry; hear "a cleaner" as someone at work with a mop.

6. 6
   nouncolloquialidiomaticcountable

   A fixer hired to dispose of bodies and remove the evidence of a crime.

   After the shooting, they brought in a cleaner to erase every trace.

   The cleaner wiped down the apartment and removed the body before dawn.

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