A fashion model who has become famous in her own right — not just a face in a photograph, but a name the public knows, with high fees, magazine covers, and a career that carries on outside the clothes. An ordinary model is hired to show a dress; a supermodel is hired partly because she is herself.

The word existed earlier, but it took off in the late 1980s and early 1990s, when a small group — Naomi Campbell, Linda Evangelista, Cindy Crawford, Christy Turlington and a few others — became household names. That period is what people mean by "the supermodel era".

It is a journalist's word, used in newspapers, gossip magazines and advertising, and it is nearly always used about women, though "male supermodel" exists. Because it is a fame word, not a beauty word, there is no test for it: whether someone counts as a supermodel is exactly the kind of thing magazines argue about.