what's
/wʌts/contraction
what's is spelled W-H-A-T-S: 5 letters and one syllable. It appears 158 times per million words in written English, the 638th most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As a contraction, what's means “What is” (English Wiktionary, September 2026).
How many letters and syllables are in what's?
| Letters | 5: W-H-A-T-S |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 1 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | 158 times per million words; the 638th most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | none measured in 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).
How common is what's?
What's appears 158 times per million words in written English, the 638th 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 what's?
- UK /wɒts/
- US /wʌts/
- US /wɑts/
What's 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-what's.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
What does what's mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
contraction
- 1
What is.
What’s going on?
- 2
What has.
What’s that got to do with it?
- 3
What does.
What’s that mean?
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).