Wether or whether?
wether is a noun meaning “A castrated goat”; whether is a conjunction meaning “Introduces a simple indirect question (without a correlative)”. Use wether as a noun and whether as a conjunction. In written English (wordfreq, 2021 data) whether is about 347 times as common as wether.
What is the difference between wether and whether?
| wether | whether | |
|---|---|---|
| Part of speech | noun, verb | conjunction, determiner, pronoun |
| Meaning | A castrated goat A castrated ram To castrate a male sheep or goat | Introduces a simple indirect question (without a correlative) Indicates doubt between possibilities (usually with correlative or) |
| Example | none recorded | Whether we'll be on time I'm unsure |
| Forms | wethers | none |
| Pronunciation | /ˈwɛðɚ/ /ˈwɛðə/ /ˈweðə/ | /ˈwɛðə(ɹ)/ /ˈʍɛðə(ɹ)/ |
| In writing | about once in every 2 million words | 209 times per million words |
Sources: wether and whether 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 wether and whether
wether
- 1
A castrated goat
- 2
To castrate a male sheep or goat
- 3
A castrated ram
whether
- 1
Introduces a simple indirect question (without a correlative)
Whether we'll be on time I'm unsure
- 2
Indicates doubt between possibilities (usually with correlative or)
He chose the correct answer, but whether by luck or by skill I don't know
- 3
Introduces a disjunctive adverbial clause qualifying the main clause (with correlative or)
He's coming, whether you like it or not
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, wether or whether?
wether appears about once in every 2 million words; whether 209 times per million words.
wether about once in every 2 million wordswhether 209 times per 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 wether vs whether?
“wether vs whether” is searched about 30 times a month on Bing (Google reports it together with close variants, so it has no figure of its own) in the United States.
Sources: Google Ads keyword data through DataForSEO and Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, the average month from September 2025 to August 2026.