Word.ws English Dictionary

straits

straits is the plural of strait.

straits is the third-person singular simple present indicative of strait.

Meaning of strait

Noun

strait (plural straits)

  1. A narrow channel of water connecting two larger bodies of water.
    • the Strait of Gibraltar
  2. A narrow pass, passage or street.
    • He brought him through a darksom narrow strayt,
      To a broad gate all built of beaten gold:1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book II, Canto VII”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, page 282
  3. A neck of land; an isthmus.
    • The bold Sir Bedivere uplifted him,
      Sir Bedivere, the last of all his knights,
      And bore him to a chapel nigh the field,
      A broken chancel with a broken cross,
      That stood on a dark strait of barren land.1842, Alfred Tennyson, “Morte d’Arthur”, in Poems. […], volume II, London: Edward Moxon, […], →OCLC, page 4
  4. (in plural, often) A difficult position.
    • to be in dire straits

See all 14 meanings of strait

Proper noun capitalized: Straits

the Straits

  1. (abbreviation, ellipsis, historical) Ellipsis of the Straits Settlements, a former British colony along the Strait of Malacca.
    • It may have been originally in India, as it is now in the Straits, a closed litter for ladies of rank, and the word may have become appropriated to the open conveyance in which European ladies are carried.1886, Henry Yule & al., Hobson-Jobson..., s.v. "Jompon"
    • Straits-born Chinese
  2. (abbreviation, ellipsis, informal) Ellipsis of Dire Straits, a British rock band.

Phrases with straits

7 more phrasesFewer phrases

Questions about straits

What is straits the plural of?
Straits is the plural of strait.
What part of speech is straits?
Straits is a proper noun.

Words near straits in the dictionary

  1. straitlacedly
  2. straitlacedness
  3. straitly
  4. straitness
  5. straitnesses
  6. straits
  7. Straits dollar
  8. Straits dollars
  9. Straits of Florida
  10. Straits of Gibraltar
  11. Straits of Hormuz

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: straits (page history and authors); Straits (page history and authors); strait (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:

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