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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

whistle.

A device designed to be placed in the mouth and blown, or driven by steam or some other mechanism, to make a whistling sound.

7 characters2 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/ˈwɪs(ə)l/[ˈwɪsl̩]/ˈʍɪs(ə)l/[ˈw̥ɪsl̩]
  1. A device designed to be placed in the mouth and blown, or driven by steam or some other mechanism, to make a whistling sound.

    countable · uncountable
  2. An act of whistling.

    countable · uncountable
  3. A shrill, high-pitched sound made by whistling.

    countable · uncountable
  4. Any high-pitched sound similar to the sound made by whistling.

    countable · uncountable
  5. A suit (from whistle and flute).

    Cockney · countable · slang · uncountable
  6. The mouth and throat; so called as being the organs of whistling.

    colloquial · countable · uncountable
Where this word comes from

From Middle English whistel, whistil, whistle, from Old English hwistle, from the verb (see below).

verb/ˈwɪs(ə)l/[ˈwɪsl̩]/ˈʍɪs(ə)l/[ˈw̥ɪsl̩]
  1. To make a shrill, high-pitched sound by forcing air through the mouth. To produce a whistling sound, restrictions to the flow of air are created using the teeth, tongue and lips.

    ambitransitive
    Never whistle at a funeral.
    He was whistling a happy tune.
  2. To make a similar sound by forcing air through a musical instrument or a pipe etc.

    ambitransitive
    The steam train whistled as it passed by.
  3. To move in such a way as to create a whistling sound.

    intransitive
    A bullet whistled past.
  4. To send, signal, or call by a whistle.

    transitive
  5. To request admission to Opus Dei, a Roman Catholic organization.

    intransitive · slang
Where this word comes from

From Middle English whistlen, from Old English hwistlan, hwistlian (“to whistle”), from Proto-West Germanic *hwistlōn, from Proto-Germanic *hwistlōną (“to make a hissing sound”). Cognate with Swedish vissla (“to whistle”), Icelandic hvísla (“to whisper”), Russian свистеть (svistetʹ, “to whistle”).

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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.