froth
Americannoun
-
an aggregation of bubbles, as on an agitated liquid or at the mouth of a hard-driven horse; foam; spume.
-
a foam of saliva or fluid resulting from disease.
-
something unsubstantial, trivial, or evanescent.
The play was a charming bit of froth.
- Synonyms:
- nonsense, fluff, frivolity, triviality
verb (used with object)
-
froths,
present (3rd person singular)
-
frothed,
past participle, past
-
frothing
present participle
-
to cover with froth.
giant waves frothing the sand.
-
to cause to foam.
to froth egg whites with a whisk.
-
to emit like froth.
a demagogue frothing his hate.
verb (used without object)
-
froths,
present (3rd person singular)
-
frothed,
past participle, past
-
frothing
present participle
noun
-
a mass of small bubbles of air or a gas in a liquid, produced by fermentation, detergent, etc
-
a mixture of saliva and air bubbles formed at the lips in certain diseases, such as rabies
-
trivial ideas, talk, or entertainment
verb
-
to produce or cause to produce froth
-
(tr) to give out in the form of froth
-
(tr) to cover with froth
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
-
frothernoun
-
frothinessnoun
-
outfrothverb (used with object)
-
frothyadjective
-
unfrothedadjective
-
unfrothingadjective
-
frothilyadverb
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
frothsimple
-
frothssimple
-
have frothedperfect
-
has frothedperfect
-
am frothingprogressive
-
are frothingprogressive
-
is frothingprogressive
-
have been frothingperfect progressive
-
has been frothingperfect progressive
Past
-
frothedsimple
-
had frothedperfect
-
was frothingprogressive
-
were frothingprogressive
-
had been frothingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of froth
1350–1400; Middle English frothe < Old Norse frotha froth, scum
Explanation
Froth is the gathering of small bubbles at the top of a drink, like the fizzy froth on the top of your root beer float. There's usually froth on the surface of soda, beer, and even coffee drinks like cappuccinos and lattes, which are topped with milk froth. You can use the word froth as a verb as well, to mean "fizz or foam up." Liquid soap might froth in your hands as you wash them, for example, and making candy sometimes involves cooking sugar syrup until it starts to froth. The word most likely comes from an Old Norse root, froða, or "froth."
Vocabulary lists containing froth
An Excerpt from "The Underground Railroad" by Colson Whitehead
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The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind
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Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
That’s according to the “U.S. froth forecasts” created by State Street Markets in consultation with Greenwood.
From MarketWatch ● Aug. 17, 2026
She added that this year’s outperformance for small-cap and microcap stocks “can be viewed as a sign of froth in the market.”
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 6, 2026
Instead, Mahan’s candidacy was more like Pets.com, a famous e-commerce flop that came to embody the heedless froth of the dot.com bubble.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 3, 2026
Times of froth tend to see companies linked to the theme du jour—internet, 3-D printing, electric vehicles, crypto, AI, etc.—lead the charts.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Feb. 19, 2026
Located where the cold, clear Spokane River tumbled in a white froth over a series of low falls, the town was surrounded by ponderosa pine forest and open range country.
From "The Boys in the Boat: Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics" by Daniel James Brown
You put chocolate powder in milk, and it froths.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 13, 2025
It's a natural deodorizer, froths up when mixed with vinegar, and is slightly abrasive, so it has excellent scrubbing power.
From Salon ● Oct. 28, 2021
In the video, a column of light gray smoke froths and bubbles into a bright blue sky — the initial fire in the port’s Hangar 12, where the ammonium nitrate was stored.
From New York Times ● Oct. 28, 2021
There is no hiding the pollution, since stinking foam froths at the lake's surface, especially when it rains.
From BBC ● May 27, 2017
He is as big as a bear and froths at the mouth.
From Our Young Folks—Vol. I, No. II, February 1865 An Illustrated Magazine for Boys and Girls by Various
I squeezed the trigger on the blender until the mixture frothed up the sides of the jar, threatening to spew out.
From Salon ● Nov. 27, 2022
The host held out a glass; behind him flashed a grey pic of the Bronx estuary, waves frothed with yellow foam.
From Slate ● Sep. 24, 2022
Pour yourself some coffee, add some frothed milk, snuggle under your gravity blanket, and enjoy a movie on your 1080p resolution video projector.
From The Verge ● Nov. 30, 2020
“If ever the world is to be again flooded, like the Netherlands, to kill off its rats,” Melville mused, “then the eternal whale will still survive, and … spout his frothed defiance to the skies.”
From New York Times ● May 2, 2020
White-capped waves frothed and churned in the bay.
From "Touching Spirit Bear" by Ben Mikaelsen
The partial climbdown is not likely to result in an enormous bust-up – one of Angela Rayner's steadfast allies who pioneered the wider plans said they were a "little concerned" rather than frothing with rage.
From BBC ● Nov. 29, 2025
As our modern times continue to become ever so unprecedented, you can find me frothing at the mouth for a star-studded period piece with low stakes and high fashion.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 15, 2025
What that means is we failed a lot in order to perfect it, to make the Barista the highest quality it can be, especially when it comes to frothing qualities for making lattes and cappuccinos.
From Salon ● Dec. 15, 2024
Suddenly, at the beach, there was life everywhere: fish frothing in the surf, fish flooding inlets.
From Slate ● Feb. 4, 2024
He was frothing at the mouth, the foamy spittle soaking his beard.
From "The Kite Runner" by Khaled Hosseini
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
