Sweats

How to spell sweats

6 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce sweats

What does sweats mean?

1. verbProduces moisture through the skin, typically from heat, effort, or nervousness.
2. nounLoose, soft cotton garments such as a tracksuit or jogging bottoms worn for exercise or comfort.

Sweats in a sentence

• verb

  He always sweats during a job interview.

• noun

  After work she changed into her comfortable sweats.

• verb

  The runner sweats heavily in the summer heat.

• noun

  He packed two pairs of sweats for the gym trip.

Where does sweats come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This word descends from the Old English noun 'swat' and the related verb 'swaetan', both rooted in a Germanic word for the moisture the body releases through the skin. The same ancient root sits behind the Latin 'sudor' and the Sanskrit 'sveda', all tracing back to a shared Proto-Indo-European term for perspiration. Over the centuries the vowel softened and the spelling settled on the 'ea' pattern, which is why the word looks as though it should rhyme with 'seat' yet is pronounced to rhyme with 'bet'; that mismatch is the main spelling trap. In the twentieth century the noun gained an informal plural sense, 'sweats', meaning loose athletic clothing, because such garments were designed to be worn while perspiring during exercise.

How the word is built

• sweat (from Old English swat: perspiration)
• -s (plural noun / third-person verb ending)