sputter
verb · noun
Simple meaning
To emit saliva or spit from the mouth in small, scattered portions.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
spuhterSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ˈspʌtɚ
This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.
IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.
Definition
Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.
verb
intransitive
To emit saliva or spit from the mouth in small, scattered portions, as in rapid speaking.
ambitransitive
To speak so rapidly as to emit saliva; to utter words hastily and indistinctly, with a spluttering sound, as in rage.
noun
Moist matter thrown out in small detached particles.
Confused and hasty speech.
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- C2 · Proficient (estimated)
- Frequency
- Rare
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: To emit saliva or spit from the mouth in small, scattered portions, as in rapid speaking.
Used this way, sputter is a reasonably familiar word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. It stays understated rather than dramatic. It usually sounds natural in a wide range of settings.
- Emotional tone
- Neutral
- Formality
- Neutral
- Intensity
- Mild
- How common
- Moderately common
- Connotation
- No strong connotation
- Usage feel
- Neutral and straightforward
Nearby words
- splutter , rarer, so it draws attention
- shin , more casual, better suited to speech than writing
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
More ways to use sputter
- “The solar wind protons must sputter away the surface atoms of the dust.”verb
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Common Patterns and Combinations
How this word naturally appears with others.
Word Family
Related forms, grouped by how they connect.
Inflected forms
Grammatical variations of the same word.
The noise of something spattering or sputtering explosively.
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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.