noun A person who earns the right to take part in something, especially the next round of a competition.
- Each qualifier from our region will compete in the national finals next month.
- As a qualifier, she was thrilled to line up with the top runners.
- Only one qualifier from the local club made it to the final round.
noun An early round that decides who goes through to the next stage.
- Our team won the qualifier on Saturday and now plays in the main tournament.
- The qualifier was held in a small gym, and only the top four advanced.
- Many players enter the qualifier hoping to earn a place in the big event.
- Rice is maturing at such a rate that he is now indispensable. Yes, these qualifiers may not be the most exacting examinations but he has also looked a class act at club level under manager David Moyes this season.
— Phil McNulty, England 2-1 Poland: What shape are Gareth Southgate's side in? (2021)
- But England's final qualifier, played out in the hostile surroundings of Podgorica City Stadium, turned on two incidents that will have cast a cloud over Capello's delight at reaching another major tournament.
— Phil McNulty, Euro 2012: Montenegro 2-2 England (2011)
noun (grammar) A word, often an adjective or adverb, that adds detail to or limits the meaning of another word.
- In the phrase "very tall," the word "very" is a qualifier that strengthens the adjective.
- A qualifier like "almost" can change the meaning of a sentence completely.
- Our teacher asked us to underline each qualifier in the paragraph.
noun In computing, a label that narrows down or changes the meaning of another part of the code.
- In this programming language, a type qualifier can make a variable read-only.
- The developer added a qualifier to the variable name to show how it should be used.
- A qualifier in the code told the compiler to treat the value as constant.
- The qualifier const may be prefixed to any declaration, and specifies that the value to which the data object is initialised cannot subsequently be changed.
— Conor Sexton, C++ Programming Made Simple (2012)
