whiff
Other forms: whiffs; whiffed; whiffing
A whiff can mean the hint of something you smell. When you drive past the sewage treatment plant and suddenly roll up your car windows, it's usually because you've gotten a whiff of the plant's special odor.
Whiff can be used as either a noun or verb, and it implies a brief or small puff or sniff. A person can have "a whiff of the exotic," which means they are living like the rest of us, but there is a little something about them that seems foreign or different. Sometimes, of course, odors are so overpowering that a small sniff is all you need: "Take a whiff of this," your friend might say to you, holding out a carton of sour milk. In that case, one whiff will be more than enough.
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a short light gust of airsynonyms: puff, puff of air
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a strikeout resulting from the batter swinging at and missing the ball for the third striketype of:strikeoutan out resulting from the batter getting three strikes
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drive or carry as if by a puff of air“The gust of air whiffed away the clouds”type of:blowcause to move by means of an air current
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utter with a puff of air
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perceive by inhaling through the nose
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smoke and exhale strongly
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strike out by swinging and missing the pitch charged as the thirdtype of:strike output out or be put out by a strikeout
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a lefteye flounder found in coastal waters from New England to Braziltypes:Citharichthys cornutus, horned whiffa whiff found in waters from the Bahamas and northern Gulf of Mexico to Braziltype of:
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Vocabulary lists containing whiff
A strong vocabulary reeks of intelligence, so take a whiff of these odor-related words.
In In Praise of Smelly Places, Altantic.com writer Emily Badger notes that, although distinctive smells are intrinsic to urban landscapes, we seldom ponder and plan for smells in part because we barely have the vocabulary to do so. Start changing that today by reviewing this list of words associated with smell.