Meaning & use
shifter
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Meanings
nouncountable
A lever or control in a vehicle or bicycle that you use to change gears.
Grammar: Takes an article: the shifter on the handlebars.
Patterns
- the shifter of a car
- a bike shifter
He pushed the shifter into third gear.
The bicycle's shifter stuck in the cold.
The mechanic replaced the broken shifter.
nouncountable
A person or thing that moves or changes something from one place to another.
Grammar: Often part of a compound: a furniture shifter.
Patterns
- a shifter of something
Two shifters carried the piano up the stairs.
He worked as a shifter in the warehouse.
The company is a shifter of heavy machinery.
nouncountableinformal
In fantasy stories, a being who can change into a different form, such as an animal.
Grammar: Often as shape-shifter or a compound: a wolf shifter.
Patterns
- a wolf shifter
- a shifter in a story
The heroine discovers that her neighbor is a wolf shifter.
The novel features a shifter who becomes a hawk.
The shifters in the story guard the forest.
Word forms
| plural | shifters |
|---|
Common combinations
- gear shifter
- He gripped the gear shifter tightly on the steep hill.
- shape shifter
- The film villain is a shape shifter.
- automatic shifter
- The automatic shifter slid into drive.
- paddle shifter
- Paddle shifters sit behind the steering wheel.
- bike shifter
- The bike shifter clicks smoothly.
- wolf shifter
- She wrote a romance about a wolf shifter.
Synonyms and how they differ
- gearstick
- Is the common British word for a car's manual gear lever, while shifter is general and American.
- gear lever
- Is the formal British name for the control, and shifter is more casual.
- mover
- Is a person who transports furniture, and is a plain alternative for the second sense.
- changeling
- Is a folklore creature secretly swapped for a child, narrower than a fantasy shifter.
Word family
- shift verb
- to move or change position
- shift noun
- a change or a work period
- shape-shifter noun
- a being that can change form
- shiftless adjective
- lazy and lacking ambition
- shifty adjective
- looking dishonest
Commonly confused: shifter or shifty?
shifter vs shifty
Shifty describes someone who looks dishonest, while shifter names a lever or a person or thing that moves things.
Practice
The driver pulled the ____ into reverse and slowly backed out of the space.
Choose one answer.
Shifter is the noun for the gear lever. Shifty is an adjective, shifted is a verb form, and shift is another noun or verb that does not fit after the.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “shifter”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.