frost
/fɹɔst/noun, verb
frost is spelled F-R-O-S-T: 5 letters and one syllable. It appears 8.9 times per million words in written English, the 7,672nd most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As a noun, frost means “A cover of minute ice crystals on objects that are exposed to the air. Frost is formed by the same process as dew, except that the temperature of the…” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of frost is frosts.
How many letters and syllables are in frost?
| Letters | 5: F-R-O-S-T |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 1 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | 8.9 times per million words; the 7,672nd most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | none measured in search |
| Rhymes with |
Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation and the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary; written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media); rhymes and same-letter words are computed by PlainSpell from its own word list.
How common is frost?
Frost appears 8.9 times per million words in written English, the 7,672nd 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).
How do you pronounce frost?
- UK /fɹɒst/
- US /fɹɔst/
- /fɹɑst/
Frost has one syllable (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-frost.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
What rhymes with frost?
5 words on PlainSpell end in the same sounds as frost from its last stressed vowel (/ɔst/):
Computed by PlainSpell from the pronunciations in the English Wiktionary (dump of September 2, 2026): a rhyme shares every sound from the last stressed vowel to the end; ordered by written frequency (wordfreq 3.1).
Forms of frost
- frosts plural, present, singular, he/she/it
- frosting participle, present
- frosted participle, past
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does frost mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
noun
- 1
A cover of minute ice crystals on objects that are exposed to the air. Frost is formed by the same process as dew, except that the temperature of the frosted object is below freezing.
- 2
The cold weather that causes these ice crystals to form.
- 3
Coldness or insensibility; severity or rigidity of character.
- 4
obsoleteThe act of freezing; the congelation of water or other liquid.
- 5
A shade of white, like that of frost.
- 6
datedslangA disappointment; a cheat.
- 7
A kind of light diffuser.
verb
- 1
To cover with frost.
- 2
To become covered with frost.
- 3
To coat (something, e.g. a cake) with icing to resemble frost.
- 4
informalTo anger or annoy.
I think the boss's decision frosted him a bit.
- 5
To sharpen (the points of a horse's shoe) to prevent it from slipping on ice.
- 6
To bleach individual strands of hair while leaving adjacent strands untouched.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Frost in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | givre , gel |
| German | Reif , Frost , glasieren |
| Portuguese | geada , frio , escarchar |
| Spanish | escarcha, helada, carama, cencellada, cenceñada, recencellada |
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 frost come from?
From Middle English frost, from an unmetathesized variant of Old English forst (“frost”), from Proto-Germanic *frustaz (“frost”), from Proto-Indo-European *prews- (“to freeze; frost”).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).