Wet or whet?
wet is an adjective meaning “Made up of liquid or moisture, usually (but not always) water”; whet is a verb meaning “Of an animal such as a boar: to sharpen (its horns, teeth, tusks, etc.) by…”. Use wet as an adjective and whet as a verb (wet is also a verb: “To cover or impregnate with liquid”). They sound the same (/wɛt/). In written English (wordfreq, 2021 data) wet is about 83 times as common as whet.
What is the difference between wet and whet?
| wet | whet | |
|---|---|---|
| Part of speech | adjective, noun, verb, phrase | verb, noun |
| Meaning | Made up of liquid or moisture, usually (but not always) water Of an object, etc.: covered or impregnated with liquid, usually (but not always) water Liquid or moisture | Of an animal such as a boar: to sharpen (its horns, teeth, tusks, etc.) by rubbing on a stone, etc., in preparation for an attack To make more keen or to stimulate (someone's appetite, interest, etc.); to hone, to sharpen An act of sharpening something by rubbing on an object, especially a whetstone |
| Example | Water is wet | to whet one's appetite or one's courage |
| Forms | wetter, wettest | whets, whetting, whetted |
| Pronunciation | /wɛt/ /wet/ [wet] ~ [we̞t] | /ˈwɛt/ [ˈwɛ(ʔ)t̚] |
| In writing | 35 times per million words | about once in every 2 million words |
Sources: wet and whet in the English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0); written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
Every current meaning of wet and whet
wet
- 1
Made up of liquid or moisture, usually (but not always) water
Water is wet
- 2
Liquid or moisture
- 3
To cover or impregnate with liquid
- 4
Acronym of write everything twice, a humorous backronym coined to serve as the antonym of DRY, punning on the opposition of wet and dry
- 5
Of code, having the quality of adhering to the principle of WET; containing much repetition
- 6
Of an object, etc.: covered or impregnated with liquid, usually (but not always) water
I went out in the rain and now my clothes are all wet
- 7
Rainy weather
Don't go out in the wet
- 8
To make or become wet
whet
- 1
Of an animal such as a boar: to sharpen (its horns, teeth, tusks, etc.) by rubbing on a stone, etc., in preparation for an attack
- 2
An act of sharpening something by rubbing on an object, especially a whetstone
- 3
To make more keen or to stimulate (someone's appetite, interest, etc.); to hone, to sharpen
to whet one's appetite or one's courage
- 4
An occasion to do something; a go, a turn
- 5
To make more keen; to stimulate
- 6
A period of time between two sharpenings of a scythe
- 7
To prepare for an attack
- 8
An item of drink or food consumed as an appetizer or to ward off hunger until a meal; specifically, a small amount of liquor drunk as an appetizer; a dram, a nip
Source: the English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0); obsolete, archaic, dialect and rare senses left out.
Which is more common, wet or whet?
wet appears 35 times per million words; whet about once in every 2 million words.
wet 35 times per million wordswhet about once in every 2 million words
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
How many people search wet vs whet?
“wet vs whet” is searched about 50 times a month on Google and 10 on Bing in the United States. Google counts close variants of a query together (“whet vs wet”, “wet or whet”).
Sources: Google Ads keyword data through DataForSEO and Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, the average month from September 2025 to August 2026.