freighter

noun

freight·​er ˈfrā-tər 

1

: one that loads or charters and loads a ship

2

: shipper

3

: a ship or airplane used chiefly to carry freight

Examples of freighter in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

In both book and film, Claire meets Grainier during his stint as a freighter with a horse and wagon through Idaho’s forest, but in the film Claire (Kerry Condon) is a forestry services worker posted at a remote fire lookout tower. —Rory Doherty, Time, 21 Nov. 2025

The exact cause of the large freighter’s demise during the storm remains a mystery. —Lorenzino Estrada, AZCentral.com, 10 Nov. 2025

Theories range from the Edmund Fitzgerald striking a shoal and suffering bottom damage to flooding through the freighter's hatch covers, which filled the ship with water and sank it, to rogue waves, to structural flaws in the ship that the 1975 storm made deadly. —Doyle Rice, USA Today, 9 Nov. 2025

Moments later, the plane’s left wing reportedly caught fire and an engine detached, sending the wide-body freighter crashing to the ground and erupting into a fireball. —Martha McHardy, MSNBC Newsweek, 8 Nov. 2025

Word History

Etymology

freight entry 2 + -er entry 2

First Known Use

1622, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Rhymes for freighter

• cater
• crater
• frater
• gator
• grater
• greater
• hater
• krater
• later
• plater
• prater
• rater

Kids Definition

freighter

noun

freight·​er ˈfrāt-ər 

1

: a person who carries or ships freight

2

: a ship or airplane used chiefly to carry freight