wraith

American  

[reyth] / reɪθ /

noun

• wraiths
  plural

1. an apparition of a living person supposed to portend their death.

2. a visible spirit.

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wraith British  

/ reɪθ /

noun

1. the apparition of a person living or thought to be alive, supposed to appear around the time of his death

2. a ghost or any apparition

3. an insubstantial copy of something

4. something pale, thin, and lacking in substance, such as a column of smoke

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Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• wraithlike
  adjective

Inflected Forms

Nouns

• wraiths
  plural

Etymology

Origin of wraith

First recorded in 1505–15; originally Scots; origin uncertain

Explanation

If you have a vision of your grandfather just before he passes away, you have seen a wraith or a ghostly image. Wraith can also mean something thin, wispy, or ghost-like. You could call a wisp of smoke rising from a chimney a wraith or you could say that a sick aunt had been reduced to a wraith — a thin, ghostly, figure. Sometimes it's even a compliment, which shows how we idealize wraith-like fashion models. Wraith is of unknown origins, and there aren't any other words related to it.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

wraith wraiths

A former New Yorker uprooted to the countryside, Grace suffers from a postpartum depression that makes her feel like like a dreary wraith.

From Los Angeles Times ● May 23, 2025

The original Beetlejuice, which starred Michael Keaton as an obnoxious wraith hired to help scare away a house's pretentious inhabitants, was released back in 1988.

From BBC ● Dec. 24, 2023

Tom Skerritt moves through “East of the Mountains” like a hobbled wraith.

From Seattle Times ● Sep. 21, 2021

No such strategies can keep the Lyceum’s own pervasive Mina, the vengeful wraith of a murdered girl who haunts the theater, from infiltrating Bram’s thoughts.

From New York Times ● Jun. 16, 2020

Charles, beside me, stood out sharp and almost hyper-realistic with his ruddy cheeks and labored breaths but further down, Henry had become a wraith, his large form light and strangely insubstantial in the mist.

From "The Secret History" by Donna Tartt

The score by Joseph Bishara is shivery with chorales that moan like wraiths in the wind.

From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 30, 2026

The protagonists are a couple of paranormal investigators, Red and Antea, who are trying to clear the tormented wraiths out of a haunted settlement.

From Seattle Times ● Feb. 11, 2024

"All my energy has been well and truly sucked out of me like I've been kissed by a dementor," Paolo says referring to the soul-consuming wraiths in the Harry Potter stories.

From BBC ● Aug. 25, 2023

The tales boil down to the problem of balancing empathy with self-assertion—of both practicing kindness and expressing your own needs, and all while the people around you are behaving like wraiths or aliens.

From The New Yorker ● Dec. 17, 2018

All night long, men moved through the darkness outside their tents like tongueless wraiths with cigarettes.

From "Catch-22" by Joseph Heller