mist.
Water or other liquid finely suspended in air. (Compare fog, haze.)
Meaning & usage
Water or other liquid finely suspended in air. (Compare fog, haze.)
It was difficult to see through the morning mist.
A layer of fine droplets or particles.
There was an oily mist on the lens.
Anything that dims, darkens, or hinders vision.
Where this word comes from
The noun is from Middle English mist, from Old English mist (“mist; darkness; dimness (of eyesight)”), from Proto-Germanic *mihstaz (“mist, fog”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₃migʰstos, from the root *h₃meygʰ- (“cloud, fog, drizzle”). Cognate with Scots mist (“mist, fog”), West Frisian mist (“mist”), Dutch mist (“mist”), Swedish mist (“mist, fog”), Icelandic mistur (“mist”), West Frisian miegelje (“to drizzle”), Dutch dialectal miggelen, miegelen (“to drizzle”), Lithuanian miglà (“fog”), Sanskrit मेघ (megha, “cloud”), Russian мгла (mgla, “fog, haze”). The verb is from Middle English misten, from Old English mistian.
To form mist.
It's misting this morning.
To spray fine droplets on, particularly of water.
I mist my tropical plants every morning.
To rain in very fine droplets.
To cover with a mist.
The lens was misted.
To be covered by tears.
My eyes misted when I remembered what had happened.
To disperse into a mist, accompanying operation of equipment at high speeds.
Where this word comes from
The noun is from Middle English mist, from Old English mist (“mist; darkness; dimness (of eyesight)”), from Proto-Germanic *mihstaz (“mist, fog”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₃migʰstos, from the root *h₃meygʰ- (“cloud, fog, drizzle”). Cognate with Scots mist (“mist, fog”), West Frisian mist (“mist”), Dutch mist (“mist”), Swedish mist (“mist, fog”), Icelandic mistur (“mist”), West Frisian miegelje (“to drizzle”), Dutch dialectal miggelen, miegelen (“to drizzle”), Lithuanian miglà (“fog”), Sanskrit मेघ (megha, “cloud”), Russian мгла (mgla, “fog, haze”). The verb is from Middle English misten, from Old English mistian.
past of miss
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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.
Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.