Word.ws English Dictionary

quitter

/ˈkwɪ.tə/

quitter noun: matter flowing from a wound or sore; pus. Also the alternative spelling of quittor.

Noun (1)

quitter (uncountable)

  1. (Jamaica, regional) Matter flowing from a wound or sore; pus.
    • Therfor Sathan [...] smoot Joob with a ful wickid botche fro the sole of the foot til to his top; which Joob schauyde the quytere with a schelle, and sat in the dunghil.1395, John Wycliffe, Bible, Job II
  2. (obsolete) Scoria of tin.

Verb

quitter (third-person singular simple present quitters, present participle quittering, simple past and past participle quittered)

  1. To suppurate; ooze with pus.

Noun (2)

quitter (plural quitters)

  1. One who gives in.
    • Winners never quit and quitters never win.
    • Don't be a quitter — hang in there!
    Synonyms:
    giver-upper
  2. One who succeeds in desisting from a vice, especially smoking, drinking, or drugging.
    • Quitters are winners! If you can't quit on the first try, hang in there and try to quit again!
  3. (archaic) A leaver.
  4. (obsolete) A deliverer.

Also used as

quitter is also the alternative spelling of quittor.

Synonyms of quitter

Forms of quitter

Noun
alternative formquittor
pluralquitters
alternative form (obsolete)quitture
Verb
third-person singular presentquitters
present participlequittering
past participlequittered
pastquittered

Origin of quitter

From Middle English quitter, from Anglo-Norman quiture, quyture et al., specialised use of quiture (“burn mark, burning”), from the participle stem of cuire (“to cook”), or from Latin coctura (“cooking”).

From quit + -er.

Words formed from quitter

Phrases with quitter

Words that rhyme with quitter

18 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about quitter

What does quitter mean?
Quitter means matter flowing from a wound or sore; pus.
What part of speech is quitter?
Quitter can be a noun or a verb.
How do you pronounce quitter?
Quitter is pronounced /ˈkwɪ.tə/ (UK).
What is the plural of quitter?
The plural of quitter is quitters.

Words near quitter in the dictionary

  1. quittance
  2. quittances
  3. quitted
  4. quitted scores
  5. quittedst
  6. quitter
  7. Quitter's Day
  8. Quitter's Days
  9. quittered
  10. quittering
  11. quitters

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: quitter (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-quitter.wav.

Cite this entry: “quitter.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/quitter. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.