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PlainSpell

wax

/wæks/noun, adjective, verb

wax is spelled W-A-X: 3 letters and one syllable. It appears 8.3 times per million words in written English, the 8,036th most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As a noun, wax means “Any oily, water-resistant, solid or semisolid substance; normally long-chain hydrocarbons, alcohols or esters” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of wax is waxes.

How many letters and syllables are in wax?

Letters3: W-A-X
Syllables1 (from its American pronunciation)
In writing8.3 times per million words; the 8,036th most frequent word form
Wrong spellings searchednone 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 wax?

Wax appears 8.3 times per million words in written English, the 8,036th 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 wax?

  • UK /waks/
  • US /wæks/
  • /wɛks/

Wax 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-wax.ogg, En-au-wax.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

What rhymes with wax?

3 words on PlainSpell end in the same sounds as wax from its last stressed vowel (/æks/):

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 wax

  • waxes plural, present, singular, he/she/it
  • waxing participle, present
  • waxed participle, past

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

What does wax mean?

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

noun

  1. 1

    Any oily, water-resistant, solid or semisolid substance; normally long-chain hydrocarbons, alcohols or esters.

  2. 2

    Beeswax (a wax secreted by bees).

  3. 3

    Earwax (a wax secreted by the ears).

    What role does the wax in your earhole fulfill?

  4. 4

    Any preparation containing wax, used as a polish.

  5. 5

    informalThe phonograph record format for music.

  6. 6

    USA thick syrup made by boiling down the sap of the sugar maple and then cooling it.

  7. 7

    USslangAny of a class of drugs with weed oil and butane as main ingredients; hash oil.

    He was charged with two felonies, for possession of Xanax and wax.

  8. 8

    rareThe process of growing.

  9. 9

    colloquialdatedAn outburst of anger, a loss of temper, a fit of rage.

adjective

  1. 1

    Made of wax.

verb

  1. 1

    To coat with wax or a similar material.

    waxed silk

  2. 2

    To form a wax (a thick maple syrup).

  3. 3

    To apply wax to (something, such as a shoe, a floor, a car, or an apple), usually to make it shiny.

  4. 4

    To remove hair at the roots from (a part of the body) by coating the skin with a film of wax that is then pulled away sharply.

  5. 5

    informalTo defeat utterly.

  6. 6

    slangTo kill, especially to murder a person.

  7. 7

    archaicTo record.

  8. 8

    To greaten.

    Holonym: wax and wane

  9. 9

    To increasingly assume the specified characteristic.

    Near-synonyms: become, get, go, turn, come, fall, grow

  10. 10

    To appear larger each night as a progression from a new moon to a full moon.

  11. 11

    To move from low tide to high tide.

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

Wax in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

LanguageWords
Frenchcire, fart (oily, water-resistant substance), de cire (made of wax), cirer (to coat with wax), croître (phase of a planet), devenir (to assume specified characteristic)
GermanWachs (oily, water-resistant substance), wächsern, Wachs- (made of wax), wachsen (to coat with wax), Bohnerwachs (preparation containing wax, used as a polish), wichsen (apply wax to)
Portuguesecera (oily, water-resistant substance), céreo, ceroso (made of wax), crescer (phase of a planet), encerar (apply wax to), depilar (remove hair from)
Spanishcera, esperma (oily, water-resistant substance), de cera (made of wax), encerar (to coat with wax), bolear (apply wax to), depilar (remove hair from)

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 wax come from?

From Middle English wax, from Old English weax, from Proto-Germanic *wahsą, possibly from Proto-Indo-European *woḱ-so-.

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

What to look up after wax