burner

Etymology

From burn + -er. Merged with and eclipsed related Middle English brennar, brennere (“an incendiary, incinerator”). Compare German Brenner (“burner”), Swedish brännare (“burner”).

noun

1. Someone or something which burns.
2. An element on a kitchen stove that generates localized heat for cooking.
   She lit a burner on the stove / And offered me a pipe / "I thought you'd never say hello", she said / "You look like the silent type" 1975, Bob Dylan (lyrics and music), “Tangled Up in Blue”, in Blood on the Tracks
3. (chemistry) A device that generates localized heat for experiments; a Bunsen burner.
4. A device that burns fuel; e.g. a diesel engine; a hot-air balloon's propulsion system.
5. A device for burning refuse; an incinerator.
6. (computing) A device that allows data or music to be stored on a CDR or CD-ROM.
7. (slang) Ellipsis of burner phone; a mobile phone used for only a short time and then thrown away so that the owner cannot be traced.
   No one on the corner has swagger like us / Hit me on my burner prepaid wireless 2007, “Paper Planes”, in Kala, performed by M.I.A.
8. (computing) An app that creates temporary phone numbers for a user.
9. (Internet, slang) Ellipsis of burner account.
   Internet sleuths later discovered that the username, @SO_blessed1, appeared to be a burner belonging to the Twitter user Incarcerated Bob, who had long been spreading false information. 2021-06-08, Andy Martino, Cheated: The Inside Story of the Astros Scandal and a Colorful History of Sign Stealing, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, →LCCN
10. (slang) An elaborate piece of graffiti.
    […] we were doing productions, burners like 100 feet long and as tall as we could get, standing on people's shoulders, […] 2011, Adam Melnyk, Visual Orgasm: The Early Years of Canadian Graffiti, page 84
    There is a hierarchy of sorts: a throw-up can go over a tag, a piece over a throw-up, and a burner over a piece. 2011, Scape Martinez, Graff 2: Next Level Graffiti Techniques, page 124
11. (slang) A pyrotechnic tear gas canister.
12. (slang) A gun.
13. (slang) Ellipsis of coal burner.
14. Alternative letter-case form of Burner (“participant in Burning Man”).
    In Mississippi, Tom turned an encampment of do-gooder burners into an organization he dubbed Burners Without Borders. 2011, Steven T. Jones, The Tribes of Burning Man
    White Ocean, co-founded by entrepreneurs Timur Sardarov, the son of a Russian oil magnate, and Oliver Ripley, and involving the trance DJ Paul Oakenfold, is viewed as one such camp, although it provides one of Burning Man’s biggest stages and claims to “feed hundreds of non-White Ocean burners a day”. 2016-09-05, Damien Gayle, “Luxury camp at Burning Man festival targeted by 'hooligans'”, in The Guardian