Research on academic writer development has focused exclusively on the writing output and other sources of doctoral student professional development. Nevertheless, variations in understanding ongoing development remain unclear given that academic writers involve first-year doctoral students. Hence, the study investigated the ways of understanding first-year doctoral student development as academic writers. A qualitative case study was conducted on four first-year doctoral students during their doctoral research proposal writing process. A case study analysis was conducted on the findings of understanding academic writer development in four ways and represented by four categories: (i) becoming self-assured as an academic writer, (ii) becoming acknowledged as an academic writer, (iii) becoming more productive as an academic writer, and (iv) becoming a deep thinker as an academic writer. The four ways of understanding academic writer development could be linked to the participants' embracing and expanding academic awareness. Specifically, the development represented by later categories includes the earlier categories of academic awareness. Moreover, the later categories represent increasing complexity in academic awareness and different academic writer development aspects. The findings could guide writers such as first-year doctoral students in their development as academic writers.