Whet

//ˈwɛt// noun, verb

noun, verb ·Common ·High school level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    The act of whetting something.
  2. 2
    That which whets or sharpens; especially, an appetizer.

    "sips, drams, and whets"

Verb
  1. 1
    To hone or rub on with some substance, as a piece of stone, for the purpose of sharpening – see whetstone. transitive

    "Why dost thou whet thy knife so earnestly?"

  2. 2
    sharpen by rubbing, as on a whetstone wordnet
  3. 3
    To stimulate or make more keen. transitive

    "to whet one's appetite or one's courage"

  4. 4
    make keen or more acute wordnet
  5. 5
    To preen. obsolete, transitive

Synonyms

All synonyms
quickenabetaccelerateactuateaculeateacuminate

Example

More examples

"Tom usually has a glass of wine before dinner to whet his appetite."

Etymology

From Middle English whetten, from Old English hwettan (“to whet, sharpen, incite, encourage”), from Proto-West Germanic *hwattjan, from Proto-Germanic *hwatjaną (“to incite, sharpen”), from Proto-Indo-European *kʷeh₁d- (“sharp”). Cognate with Dutch wetten (“to whet, sharpen”), German wetzen (“to whet, sharpen”), Icelandic hvetja (“to whet, encourage, catalyze”), dialectal Danish hvæde (“to whet”).

Related phrases

saw-whet owlwhet slatewhet someone's appetite

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.