A returnee is a person who comes back to their own country after living in another one — the student who studied abroad and flies home, the worker who spent years overseas, the family that left and later returns. The word points at the person, not the trip and not the country. The ending -ee is the same idea as in employee: this is the one to whom the action happens. Though actually, news writing sometimes stretches it to people coming home after a war or a disaster; the core picture is still “lived elsewhere, now home.” It is a neat, slightly official word. In warm conversation people more often say someone who came back or, in Taiwan, talk about 返台 or 歸國 without needing the English noun at all.

歸國者、返台人士。台灣多說歸國、返台；中國大陸媒體常稱留學回來的人為「海歸」。