transistor

See also: Transistor, transístor, and transistör

English

Etymology

Blend of transfer +‎ resistor. Said to have been coined by American engineer John Robinson Pierce in 1947, who used transresistance as the basis for forming transistor.

Pronunciation

• (General American) IPA^(key): /tɹænˈzɪs.tɚ/

• Audio (US):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɪstə(ɹ)

Noun

transistor (plural transistors)

2. (semiconductors) A solid-state semiconductor device, with three terminals, which can be used for amplification, switching, voltage stabilization, signal modulation, and many other functions.
   • 2017 October, “Snap Circuits Light”, in Snap Circuits‎, Elenco, pages 9, 59:

     Switches and transistors control the flow of electricity like valves and faucets control water. Resistors limit the flow of electricity. […] Light is transmitted from the color LED, through the fiber optic cable, to control the NPN transistor (Q2) and red LED (D1).

3. (dated, informal) A transistor radio.
   • 1978, Billy Joel, Half a Mile Away:

     Turn your transistor on and let the music play

Usage notes

Transistors, when referring to semiconductor components, may encompass field-effect transistors (FETs), unijunction transistors (UJTs), or bipolar junction transistors (BJTs); however, often the bipolar type is assumed.

Derived terms

• FET
• junction transistor
• pass transistor
• post-transistor
• silicon planar epitaxial transistor
• TFT
• thin-film transistor
• transistorize
• transistorized
• transistor radio
• UJT

Translations

solid-state semiconductor device, with three terminals

Arabic: تْرَانْزِسْتُور m (tranzistur) Armenian: please add this translation if you can Bulgarian: транзи́стор m (tranzístor) Catalan: transistor (ca) m Chinese: Cantonese: 電晶體 / 电晶体 (din6 zing1 tai2), 晶體管 / 晶体管 (zing1 tai2 gun2), 原子粒 Mandarin: 晶體管 / 晶体管 (zh) (jīngtǐguǎn), (Taiwan) 電晶體 / 电晶体 (diànjīngtǐ) Czech: tranzistor (cs) m Dutch: transistor (nl) m Esperanto: please add this translation if you can Estonian: transistor (et) Finnish: transistori (fi) French: transistor (fr) m Galician: transistor (gl) m Georgian: ტრანზისტორი (ṭranzisṭori) German: Transistor (de) m Greek: κρυσταλλοτρίοδος (el) f (krystallotríodos), τρανζίστορ (el) n (tranzístor) Hebrew: טרנזיסטור (he) m (tranzístor) Hungarian: tranzisztor (hu) Icelandic: smári (is) m Indonesian: transistor (id) Italian: transistor (it) m, transistore (it) m Japanese: トランジスタ (ja) (toranjisuta) Khmer: ត្រង់ស៊ីស្ទ័រ (trɑngsiistɔə) Korean: 트랜지스터 (ko) (teuraenjiseuteo) Latvian: transistors m Lithuanian: tranzistorius m Malay: transistor Maori: whitiārai Mongolian: please add this translation if you can Persian: please add this translation if you can Polish: tranzystor (pl) m Portuguese: transístor (pt) m Romanian: tranzistor (ro) n Russian: транзи́стор (ru) m (tranzístor) Serbo-Croatian: Cyrillic: транзистор m Roman: tranzistor (sh) m Spanish: transistor (es) m Swedish: transistor (sv) c Tagalog: saligwil Thai: please add this translation if you can Turkish: transistör (tr) Vietnamese: bóng bán dẫn (vi)

small portable radio

Bulgarian: транзи́стор m (tranzístor) Catalan: transistor (ca) m Czech: tranzistor (cs) m, tranďák (cs) m Estonian: transistor (et) Galician: transistor (gl) m Hebrew: טרנזיסטור (he) m (tranzístor) Italian: radiolina (it) f Lithuanian: tranzistorius m Polish: tranzystor (pl) m Russian: транзи́стор (ru) m (tranzístor), радиоприёмник (ru) m (radioprijómnik), приёмник (ru) m (prijómnik) Swedish: transistor (sv) c

The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.

Translations to be checked

Ido: (please verify) transistoro (io)

Further reading

• transistor on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

French

Etymology

Borrowed from English transistor.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /tʁɑ̃.zis.tɔʁ/

• Audio (Paris):

  (file)

• Audio (France (Toulouse)):

  (file)

• Audio (Switzerland (Valais)):

  (file)

• Audio (France):

  (file)

• Audio (France (Vosges)):

  (file)

• Audio (France (Lyon)):

  (file)

Noun

transistor m (plural transistors)

1. transistor
2. (metonymic) transistor radio
   • 1982, “Un été sans toi”, performed by Charles Aznavour:

     Sur mon matelas / Je rêve à ton corps / Soûlé par la voix / De mon transistor

     On my mattress / I dream of your body / Reeling from the voice / On my transistor

Further reading

• “transistor”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

Galician

Noun

transistor m (plural transistores)

1. a transistor (semiconductor device)
2. a transistor radio

Indonesian

Indonesian Wikipedia has an article on:

transistor

Wikipedia ^id

Etymology

Internationalism, borrowed from English transistor.

Pronunciation

• (Standard Indonesian) IPA^(key): /tranˈsistor/ [t̪ranˈsis.t̪ɔr]
• Rhymes: -istor
• Syllabification: tran‧sis‧tor

Noun

transistor (plural transistor-transistor)

1. (electronics) transistor

Derived terms

• transistor darlington
• transistor dwikutub
• transistor ekakutub
• transistor horisontal
• transistor horizontal
• transistor mosfet
• transistor penguat

Further reading

• “transistor”, in Kamus Besar Bahasa Indonesia [Great Dictionary of the Indonesian Language] (in Indonesian), Jakarta: Agency for Language Development and Cultivation – Ministry of Education, Culture, Research, and Technology of the Republic of Indonesia, 2016

Italian

Italian Wikipedia has an article on:

transistor

Wikipedia ^it

Etymology

Borrowed from English transistor.

Pronunciation

This entry needs an audio pronunciation. If you are a native speaker with a microphone, please record this word. The recorded pronunciation will appear here when it's ready.

Noun

transistor m (invariable)

1. transistor (device)
2. transistor radio

Derived terms

• fototransistor

Portuguese

Pronunciation

 

• (Brazil) IPA^(key): /tɾɐ̃.zisˈtoʁ/ [tɾɐ̃.zisˈtoh]

• (Brazil) IPA^(key): /tɾɐ̃.zisˈtoʁ/ [tɾɐ̃.zisˈtoh]
  • (São Paulo) IPA^(key): /tɾɐ̃.zisˈtoɾ/
  • (Rio de Janeiro) IPA^(key): /tɾɐ̃.ziʃˈtoʁ/ [tɾɐ̃.ziʃˈtoχ]
  • (Southern Brazil) IPA^(key): /tɾɐ̃.zisˈtoɻ/

• Hyphenation: tran‧sis‧tor

Noun

transistor m (plural transistores)

1. (Brazil) alternative form of transístor

Further reading

• “transistor”, in Dicionário Aulete Digital (in Portuguese), Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon Editora Digital, 2008–2025
• “transistor”, in Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa (in Portuguese), Lisbon: Priberam, 2008–2025

Romanian

Noun

transistor n (plural transistoare)

1. alternative form of tranzistor

Declension

	singular			plural
	indefinite	definite		indefinite	definite
nominative-accusative	transistor	transistorul		transistoare	transistoarele
genitive-dative	transistor	transistorului		transistoare	transistoarelor
vocative	transistorule			transistoarelor

Spanish

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /tɾansisˈtoɾ/ [t̪ɾãn.sisˈt̪oɾ]

• Audio (Colombia):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -oɾ
• Syllabification: tran‧sis‧tor

Noun

transistor m (plural transistores)

1. transistor

Further reading

• “transistor”, in Diccionario de la lengua española [Dictionary of the Spanish Language] (in Spanish), online version 23.8.1, Royal Spanish Academy [Spanish: Real Academia Española], 15 December 2025

Swedish

Swedish Wikipedia has an article on:

transistor

Wikipedia ^sv

Noun

transistor c

1. (electronics) a transistor (semiconductor component)
2. (dated) a transistor, a transistor radio

Declension

Declension of transistor

		nominative	genitive
singular	indefinite	transistor	transistors
	definite	transistorn	transistorns
plural	indefinite	transistorer	transistorers
	definite	transistorerna	transistorernas