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PlainSpell

sweat

/swɛt/noun, verb

sweat is spelled S-W-E-A-T: 5 letters and one syllable. It appears 14 times per million words in written English, the 5,679th most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As a noun, sweat means “Fluid that exits the body through pores in the skin usually due to physical stress and/or high temperature for the purpose of regulating body…” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of sweat is sweats.

How many letters and syllables are in sweat?

Letters5: S-W-E-A-T
Syllables1 (from its American pronunciation)
In writing14 times per million words; the 5,679th most frequent word form
Wrong spellings searchednone measured in search
Same letters

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 sweat?

Sweat appears 14 times per million words in written English, the 5,679th 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 sweat?

  • /swɛt/

Sweat 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-sweat.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

What rhymes with sweat?

No other word on PlainSpell ends in the same sounds as sweat.

Spelled with the same letters in another order: waste, tawse.

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 sweat

  • sweats plural, present, singular, he/she/it
  • sweating participle, present
  • sweated past, participle

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

What does sweat mean?

The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).

noun

  1. 1

    Fluid that exits the body through pores in the skin usually due to physical stress and/or high temperature for the purpose of regulating body temperature and removing certain compounds from the circulation.

  2. 2

    The state of one who is sweating; diaphoresis.

    Just thinking about the interview tomorrow puts me into a nervous sweat.

  3. 3

    Hard work; toil.

  4. 4

    Moisture issuing from any substance.

  5. 5

    A short run by a racehorse as a form of exercise.

  6. 6

    The sweating sickness.

  7. 7

    UKslangA soldier (especially one who is old or experienced).

  8. 8

    slangAn extremely or excessively competitive player.

verb

  1. 1

    To emit sweat.

  2. 2

    To cause to excrete moisture through skin.

  3. 3

    To cause to perspire.

    His physicians attempted to sweat him by most powerful sudorifics.

  4. 4

    informalTo work hard.

    I've been sweating over my essay all day.

  5. 5

    informalTo be extremely dedicated to winning a game; to play competitively.

    There's no way we can win. These guys are sweating so hard.

  6. 6

    informalTo extract money, labour, etc. from, by exaction or oppression.

    to sweat a spendthrift

  7. 7

    informalTo worry.

  8. 8

    informalTo worry about (something).

    Don't sweat it!

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

Sweat in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

LanguageWords
Frenchsueur, transpiration (fluid that exits the body through pores), troufion, troupier (slang for soldier), transpirer, suer (to emit sweat)
GermanSchweiß, Schwitze (fluid that exits the body through pores), schwitzen (to emit sweat), sich sorgen (informal: to worry), anschwitzen (transitive: to cook slowly without browning)
Portuguesesuor (fluid that exits the body through pores), transpirar, suar (to emit sweat)
Spanishsudor, jumpi, trasudor (fluid that exits the body through pores), sudar, transpirar, trasudar (to emit sweat)

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 sweat come from?

From Middle English swete, swet, swate, swote, from Old English swāt, from Proto-Germanic *swait-, *swaitą, from Proto-Indo-European *swoyd- (“to sweat”), o-grade of *sweyd- (“to sweat”). Cognate with West Frisian swit, Dutch zweet, German Schweiß, Danish sved, Norwegian Bokmål svette, Norwegian Nynorsk sveitte, Swedish svett, Yiddish שוויצן (shvitsn) (English shvitz), Latin sudor, French sueur, Italian sudore, Spanish sudor, Portuguese suor, Persian خوی (xway, “sweat”), Sanskrit स्वेद (svéda), Lithuanian sviedri, Tocharian B syā-, Albanian djersë, and Welsh chwys.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

What to look up after sweat