waist
/weɪst/noun
waist is spelled W-A-I-S-T: 5 letters and one syllable. It appears 9.1 times per million words in written English, the 7,553rd most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As a noun, waist means “The part of the body between the pelvis and the stomach” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of waist is waists.
How many letters and syllables are in waist?
| Letters | 5: W-A-I-S-T |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 1 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | 9.1 times per million words; the 7,553rd most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | none measured in search |
| Pairs people search |
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); Bing searches in the United States: the average month from September 2025 to August 2026 (Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, read September 30, 2026).
How common is waist?
Waist appears 9.1 times per million words in written English, the 7,553rd 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 waist?
- /weɪst/
Waist 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-waste.ogg, LL-Q1860_(eng)-Vealhurl-waist.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Words people confuse with waist
Word pairs people search, with the monthly searches for “a vs b” (G: Google, B: Bing, United States).
Sources: Google and Bing searches (September 2025 to August 2026, through DataForSEO); English Wiktionary (homophones, alternative spellings).
Forms of waist
- waists plural
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does waist mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
noun
- 1
The part of the body between the pelvis and the stomach.
- 2
A part of a piece of clothing that covers the waist.
- 3
The narrow connection between the thorax and abdomen in certain insects (e.g., bees, ants and wasps).
- 4
The middle portion of the hull of a ship or the fuselage of an aircraft.
- 5
That part of the upper deck of a ship between the quarterdeck and the forecastle.
- 6
The middle part of anything.
The waist of a bell widens into the lip.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Waist in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | taille , ceinture |
| German | Taille , Hüfttuch , Rumpf, Schiffsrumpf , Mittelteil, Mitte |
| Portuguese | cintura |
| Spanish | cintura, cinto, talle |
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 waist come from?
Inherited from Middle English wast (“waist”), probably from Old English *wæst, *wǣst, *weaxt, *wæhst, from Proto-West Germanic *wahstu, from Proto-Germanic *wahstuz (“growth, development, stature, build”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₂weks- (“to multiply, increase”). Cognate with Middle English wacste (“growth, increase, might, power”), Middle High German wahst (“growth”), Danish vækst (“growth”), Swedish växt (“growth, development, size”), Icelandic vöxtur (“growth”), Gothic 𐍅𐌰𐌷𐍃𐍄𐌿𐍃 (wahstus, “growth”). Related to Old English weaxan (“to grow, increase”). More at wax.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).