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PlainSpell

waste

/ˈweɪ̯st/noun, adjective, verb

waste is spelled W-A-S-T-E: 5 letters and one syllable. It appears 65 times per million words in written English, the 1,636th most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As a noun, waste means “Excess of material, useless by-products, or damaged, unsaleable products; garbage; rubbish” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of waste is wastes.

How many letters and syllables are in waste?

Letters5: W-A-S-T-E
Syllables1
In writing65 times per million words; the 1,636th most frequent word form
Wrong spellings searchednone measured in search
Pairs people search
Same letters

Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation; 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); rhymes and same-letter words are computed by PlainSpell from its own word list.

How common is waste?

Waste appears 65 times per million words in written English, the 1,636th 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 waste?

  • /ˈweɪ̯st/
  • [ˈweɪ̯st]

Waste has one syllable.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: LL-Q1860_(eng)-Naomi_Persephone_Amethyst_(NaomiAmethyst)-waste.wav, En-us-waste.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

Words people confuse with waste

Word pairs people search, with the monthly searches for “a vs b” (G: Google, B: Bing, United States).

waist vs waste0 B

Sources: Google and Bing searches (September 2025 to August 2026, through DataForSEO); English Wiktionary (homophones, alternative spellings).

What rhymes with waste?

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

Spelled with the same letters in another order: sweat, 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 waste

  • wastes plural, present, singular, he/she/it
  • more waste comparative
  • most waste superlative
  • wasting participle, present
  • wasted participle, past, singular, he/she/it, plural

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

What does waste mean?

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

noun

  1. 1

    Excess of material, useless by-products, or damaged, unsaleable products; garbage; rubbish.

  2. 2

    Excrement or urine.

    The cage was littered with animal waste.

  3. 3

    A wasteland; an uninhabited desolate region; a wilderness or desert.

  4. 4

    A place that has been laid waste or destroyed.

  5. 5

    A large tract of uncultivated land.

  6. 6

    The part of the land of a manor (of whatever size) not used for cultivation or grazing, nowadays treated as common land.

  7. 7

    A vast expanse of water.

  8. 8

    A disused mine or part of one.

adjective

  1. 1

    derogatoryslangUseless and contemptible.

  2. 2

    archaicUncultivated, uninhabited.

  3. 3

    Barren; desert; empty.

  4. 4

    Rejected as being defective; eliminated as being worthless; produced in excess.

  5. 5

    Superfluous; needless.

  6. 6

    Dismal; gloomy; cheerless.

  7. 7

    Unfortunate; disappointing.

verb

  1. 1

    To devastate; to destroy.

  2. 2

    To squander (money or resources) uselessly; to spend (time) idly; to dissipate.

    We wasted millions of dollars and several years on that project.

  3. 3

    slangTo kill; to murder.

  4. 4

    To wear away by degrees; to impair gradually; to deteriorate; to diminish by constant loss; to use up; to consume; to spend; to wear out.

  5. 5

    To gradually lose weight, weaken, become frail.

  6. 6

    To be diminished; to lose bulk, substance, strength, value etc. gradually.

  7. 7

    To damage, impair, or injure (an estate, etc.) voluntarily, or by allowing the buildings, fences, etc., to fall into decay.

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

Waste in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

LanguageWords
GermanMüll, Abfall, Ausschuss (useless by-products, garbage), Exkrement (excrement or urine), Einöde (wasteland, desolate region), Saustall [vulgär] (place that has been laid waste)
Portugueselixo, refugo, dejeto (useless by-products, garbage), fezes, excremento (excrement or urine), deserto (wasteland, desolate region)
Spanishdesperdicio, desecho, desechos, basura, acribaduras, ahechadura (useless by-products, garbage)
Frenchterrain vague, terre en friche, stérile (wasteland, desolate region), gaspillage (action of wasting, ineffective use), dégradation, dégénération (gradual loss or decay)

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 waste come from?

From Middle English wast, waste (“a waste”, noun), from Anglo-Norman, Old Northern French wast, waste (“a waste”), from Frankish *wōstī (“a waste”), from Proto-Germanic *wōstaz, *wōstuz, from Proto-Indo-European *h₁weh₂- (“empty, wasted”).

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

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