Word.ws English Dictionary

whisky

Syllables: whis·ky/ˈwɪski/

whisky is the alternative form of whiskey.

Meaning of whiskey

Noun (1)

whiskey (countable and uncountable, plural whiskeys or whiskies)

  1. (England, Ireland, US) A liquor distilled from the fermented mash of grain (as rye, corn, or barley).
    • The exceſſive drinking of ſpirituous liquours, eſpecially whiſkey, is now become ſo common, that more people are killed by them, than by ſmall-pox, fevers, broken limbs, accidents, and all other diſtempers put together. And we are credibly informed, that in one dram ſhop only in this town, there...1753 September, “Historical Chronicle”, in The Gentleman's Magazine, volume XXIII, number VIII, London, page 391
  2. (England, Ireland, US) A drink of whiskey.

Noun (2)

whiskey (plural whiskeys)

  1. (historical) A light gig or carriage drawn by one horse.
    • Ye Ladies of Lapland who beesoms bestride,
      Or, pair’d in Witch Whiskeys, aslant the Moon slide;1772, George Alexander Stevens, “The Portrait”, in Songs, Comic, and Satyrical, Oxford, page 202
    Synonyms:
    tim-whiskey

Synonyms of whisky

Forms of whisky

pluralwhiskies

Origin of whisky

Variant of usque, abbreviation of usquebaugh (compare obsolete whiskybae), from Scottish Gaelic uisge-beatha (“water of life”), calque of Medieval Latin aqua vitae. Compare akvavit, aquavit, aqua vitae, eau de vie, and water of life from the same source.

From whisk + -y.

Words formed from whisky

Phrases with whisky

Words that rhyme with whisky

Questions about whisky

What is whisky the alternative form of?
Whisky is the alternative form of whiskey.
How do you pronounce whisky?
Whisky is pronounced /ˈwɪski/.

Words near whisky in the dictionary

  1. whiskless
  2. whisklike
  3. whisks
  4. whisks away
  5. whisks off
  6. whisky
  7. whisky butter
  8. whisky fungi
  9. whisky fungus
  10. whisky jack
  11. whisky jacks

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: whisky (page history and authors); whiskey (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: En-us-whisky.ogg.

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