From Spanish chile habanero “chili from Havana”
A habanero is a small, extremely hot pepper. Habaneros come in various colors, ranging from green to dark red, but you can't tell how hot a habanero is until you taste it. The habanero was once declared the hottest chile by Guiness World Records, but it was eventually overtaken by even spicier peppers. Habaneros have a deceptively sweet initial flavor, with their intense heat increasing over several minutes and often lasting as long as an hour. The habanero was named for the Cuban city of Havana, or La Habana in Spanish.
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
But much more than heat makes the habanero a culinary charmer worth bringing into your home.
From Seattle Times ● Jan. 15, 2024
For comparison, a habanero pepper typically hits 100,000 Scoville heat units, but Pepper X registers at 2.69 million units.
From BBC ● Oct. 17, 2023
The only thing that was missing, I said, was the habanero salsa that typically accompanies Yucateco cooking.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 6, 2023
Serrano's version is a sesame and beet mole with sliced beets, fennel, pine nuts, kumquats and habanero kosho.
From Salon ● Aug. 20, 2023
“Do you want the habanero pepper or the bag of magazines? Do you want to get caught while taking out our Special friend? Or save a precious piece of human heritage from these barbarians?”
From "Uglies" by Scott Westerfeld
Restaurant chains from Chick-fil-A to Buffalo Wild Wings are amping up the condiments rush, recently introducing new items such as Zesty Buffalo Sauce and Habanero Hot Sauce at retail.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 17, 2026
In classic fashion, several Canadian franchisees that I reached out to refused to gloat about their strawberry pies and Spicy Habanero McChickens.
From Slate ● Sep. 7, 2023
I love tacos, and my favorite taco place is Taqueria Habanero.
From Washington Post ● Mar. 28, 2019
Some flavors in the lab now have no name or a clear path to a store shelf, but ideas like Tabasco Sriracha and Habanero Tabasco began there.
From Washington Times ● Nov. 24, 2018
Every night, upon leaving the theater, he betook himself to the Café Habanero, where he habitually consumed a beefsteak, together with a small measure of beer.
From First Love (Little Blue Book #1195) And Other Fascinating Stories of Spanish Life by Alarcón, Pedro Antonio de
Their choice of peppers isn’t your run-of-the-mill jalapeños or habaneros.
From Salon ● Apr. 6, 2025
Peppers: Moine grows both bell peppers and habaneros on her patio and says they grow well.
From Seattle Times ● Aug. 25, 2023
Lime and habaneros make this saltfish buljol, a Caribbean cod dish, taste spiky and bright.
From New York Times ● May 8, 2023
Serranos are 10,000-25,000, and habaneros, the hottest peppers most of us are likely to cook with, start around 100,000 and can top 300,000.
From Washington Post ● Aug. 31, 2022
Last week, I counted another few dozen habaneros sprouting in various shades of green and red on my plant, springing up like gremlins after you throw water on them.
From Salon ● Oct. 23, 2019
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.
