expectorant
noun, adjective
expectorant is a noun meaning “An agent or drug used to cause or induce the expulsion of phlegm from the lungs” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled E-X-P-E-C-T-O-R-A-N-T and has 4 syllables, and it appears about once in every 16 million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data). The plural of expectorant is expectorants.
What does expectorant mean?
noun
- 1
An agent or drug used to cause or induce the expulsion of phlegm from the lungs.
adjective
- 1
Causing or assisting the expulsion of phlegm.
an expectorant preparation
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How do you pronounce expectorant?
- US
Expectorant has 4 syllables (counted from its American pronunciation in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: En-us-expectorant.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Forms of expectorant
- expectorants plural
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How common is expectorant?
Expectorant appears about once in every 16 million words in written English, the 121,279th most frequent word form in the list.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
Expectorant in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense agent or drug used to cause or induce the expulsion of phlegm from the lungs:
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | expectorant |
| German | Schleimlöser, Abhustemittel, Expektorans, Hustenlöser, schleimlösendes Mittel |
| Portuguese | expectorante |
| Spanish | expectorante |
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.
Where does expectorant come from?
From expectorate + -ant.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).