ripper

C2+ Topic:People & Society

US /ˈrɪpɚ/ UK /ˈrɪpə/ See IPA manual

Meanings

1

noun
a person or tool that rips; informally, something excellent

That last goal was an absolute ripper.

Thesaurus

Synonyms

1 noun · a person or tool that rips;... tearerslashercorkerbeauty cracker stunner

Word family

Related forms rip ripping ripped

Etymology

From rip + -er; rip is of uncertain origin, possibly from Flemish rippen ('to strip off roughly') or related to reap. The slang sense 'something excellent' is 19th-century.

Topics

People & Society Word Formation & Derivatives

External links

# ripper

**Type:** Word
**Level:** C2+
**Part of speech:** noun
**IPA (US):** /ˈrɪpɚ/
**IPA (UK):** /ˈrɪpə/

## Meanings
1. a person or tool that rips; informally, something excellent

## Examples
- That last goal was an absolute ripper.

## Synonyms
- tearer
- slasher
- corker
- beauty
- cracker
- stunner

## Related Forms
- rip
- ripping
- ripped

## Etymology
From rip + -er; rip is of uncertain origin, possibly from Flemish rippen ('to strip off roughly') or related to reap. The slang sense 'something excellent' is 19th-century.

## AI Etymology
Ripper comes from rip + -er; rip is of uncertain origin, possibly from Flemish rippen ('to strip off roughly') or related to reap. The slang sense 'something excellent' is 19th-century. Older glosses in the chain include "to strip off roughly" and "something excellent", which help explain the semantic range of the modern word. Morphologically, ripper is best read as compound, suffixal formation, and uncertain formation, yielding an English noun shaped by both form history and later usage. In current English it functions as a noun, with the sense "a person or tool that rips; informally, something excellent". related forms include rip, ripping, and ripped. The result is an English noun whose etymology preserves the older forms while supporting the word's specialized modern meaning.

## Topics
- People & Society
- Word Formation & Derivatives

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