warship
Americannoun
-
warships
plural
noun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of warship
Explanation
A warship is a military sea vessel that's usually armed with weapons. A country's navy uses warships in battles or to transport troops. A battleship is one specific kind of warship, a very large one that's outfitted with weapons and heavily defended against attack. All warships are prepared for war (which is where they get their name), and most of them are controlled by the naval forces of a nation. Many countries move their warships into particular regions to exert political force on adversaries, or send them to protect civilian or cargo ships from pirate attacks.
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:
The Russian warship requested that that HMS Tyne reposition to a safer distance, which it did.
From BBC ● Jul. 20, 2026
The Russian frigate, Neustrashimy, was also being monitored by a French military aircraft which made radio contact with the warship asking it to clarify its intentions, the BBC has been told.
From BBC ● Jul. 20, 2026
Rheinmetall RHM -15.06%decrease; red down pointing triangle shares fell sharply after media reports indicated Germany is abandoning plans to build a new warship model, sinking one of the biggest projects in the arms maker’s pipeline.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 24, 2026
Germany on Wednesday pulled the plug on its largest naval order in decades after the anti-submarine warship project suffered delays, a setback for the country's ambitions to overhaul its military.
From Barron's ● Jun. 24, 2026
Elizebeth also had to search for signs of hostile actions—anything from a foreign warship laying mines to submarines behaving strangely off the American coastline.
From "The Woman All Spies Fear" by Amy Butler Greenfield
This includes Britain's Dreadnought programme, which is building the Royal Navy's next-generation nuclear deterrent submarines, and the Type 26 frigate programme, which is developing a fleet of advanced anti-submarine warships.
From BBC ● Aug. 7, 2026
Rescuers with backup from two Indonesian warships and a navy surveillance aircraft were searching for survivors even as estimates of the number of missing people kept changing.
From Barron's ● Aug. 3, 2026
The country has used its low-cost, unmanned platforms to take out valuable Russian targets, including warships, aircraft and infrastructure.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 21, 2026
Key plans to transform the military with drones, and uncrewed warships and aircraft are still not fully funded.
From BBC ● Jul. 20, 2026
These bits of information included where British troops were stationed, what forts were being built, how many warships were entering and leaving New York Harbor, and how much food the troops had.
From "George Washington, Spymaster" by Thomas B. Allen
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.
