Skip to main content

fisher

/ˈfɪʃɚ/noun

fisher is a noun meaning “A person who catches fish, especially for a living or for sport; a person engaging in the pastime of fishing” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled F-I-S-H-E-R and has 2 syllables, and it appears 10 times per million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data). The plural of fisher is fishers.

What does fisher mean?

noun

  1. 1

    A person who catches fish, especially for a living or for sport; a person engaging in the pastime of fishing.

  2. 2

    A North American marten-like mammal (Pekania pennanti), that has thick brown fur.

  3. 3

    Fur of specimens of species Pekania pennanti.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

How do you pronounce fisher?

  • UK /ˈfɪʃə/
  • US /ˈfɪʃɚ/

Fisher has 2 syllables (counted from its American pronunciation in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary).

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: En-us-fisher.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

Forms of fisher

  • fishers plural

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

How common is fisher?

Fisher appears 10 times per million words in written English, the 6,884th most frequent word form in the list.

Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).

Words people confuse with fisher

Sounds like: fissure (Wiktionary's homophone list; some hold only in some accents).

Sources: English Wiktionary (homophones, alternative spellings).

Fisher in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

LanguageWords
Frenchpêcheur, pêcheuse, bateau de pêche, bateau-pêcheur (person who fishes), pékan (marten)
GermanFischer, Fischerin (person who fishes), Fischermarder (marten)
Portuguesepescador (person who fishes)
Spanishpescador, pishiñero (person who fishes)

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.

Where does fisher come from?

From Middle English fischer, fischare, from Old English fisċere (“fisher”), from Proto-Germanic *fiskārijaz (“fisher”), equivalent to fish + -er. Cognate with Saterland Frisian Fisker (“fisher”), West Frisian fisker (“fisher”), Dutch visser (“fisher”), German Low German Fisker, Fisser (“fisher”), German Fischer (“fisher”), Danish fisker (“fisher”), Swedish fiskare (“fisher”).

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).