ghost
Pluralghosts
Pluralghosts
Formsghosts, ghosting, ghosted
- 1The spirit of a dead person, believed to appear to living people.
Like a person you can see through but cannot touch.
Many people believe a ghost lives in the old house.
She was sure she saw a ghost on the dark stairs.
UsageSay you believe in ghosts.
Similarspirit, phantom, apparition, specter, spook
Note
- 2Used before a noun for something strange that may be supernatural or from another world.
Like the strange creatures people claim to see but can never prove.
Old farmers still talk about the ghost lights they saw over the hills.
In 1946, people in Sweden reported strange ghost rockets flying across the sky.
Similarphantom
- 3Left completely empty after everyone living there has gone away.
Like a school building during the summer, with nobody inside.
The mining settlement became a ghost town after the gold ran out.
Sailors steered clear of the ghost ship drifting without a crew.
UsageSay ghost town for an empty town.
Note
- 4To suddenly stop all contact with someone and give no reason, often to end a relationship.
Like walking out of a room and never coming back, with no goodbye.
He ghosted her after their third date and never texted again.
Please don't ghost me if you lose interest in talking.
UsageSay you got ghosted.
Note
- 5A very faint sign or shape of something that is almost gone.
Like the faint mark a pencil leaves after you erase it.
The moon was a pale ghost in the morning sky.
He gave a ghost of a smile and looked away.
UsageNot a ghost of a chance means no chance.
Similarshadow, trace, hint, suggestion, semblance
Note
- 6To write or perform something, such as a book or a singing part, that someone else gets credit for.
Like baking a cake so that someone else can put their name on it.
She ghosted his entire campaign speech in one night.
Writers sometimes ghost novels for famous actors.
UsageSay ghost for someone.
Similarghostwrite
Note
- 7Short form of ghostwriter: a person paid to write something that another person puts their name on.
Most of his bestselling books were really written by a ghost.
She earns a living as a ghost for busy executives.
UsageSay a ghost for someone.
Note
- 8A person or thing that seems to be there, or is on a list, but is not real.
Like a sound you think you hear but isn't really there.
The accountant deleted a ghost entry from the ledger.
Radar picked up a ghost signal that vanished on the next sweep.
Similarphantom
Note
- 9Pale or whitish in color.
Like the pale color of fresh snow under a cloudy sky.
The ghost crab is so pale that it almost disappears on the sand.
The rare ghost orchid blooms a faint, milky white.
Note
- 10A faint extra copy of a picture that appears by mistake in a camera, telescope, or TV.
Like a faint reflection you see in a window at night.
A ghost showed up in the photo whenever she pointed the camera near the sun.
The bright street lamp left a faint ghost in the telescope view.
Less common meanings
- 11The spirit or soul of a person, seen as separate from the body.
hen gins her grieued ghost thus to lament and mourne.
1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie QueeneHere, ghost means a person's spirit or soul.Enlightening the eyes and a taste for hope, emotions are felt from an inward ghost.
2013, Kenneth Palmer, Just Thoughts: Looking at Man's Whole SelfHere, ghost means the spirit or soul inside a person.UsageGive up the ghost means die or stop working.
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- 12Short form of ghost pepper: a very hot chili pepper that adds strong heat to food.
He added a single ghost to the curry and could barely eat it.
One bite of a ghost left her eyes watering.
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- 13To move quietly and smoothly, like a spirit, so no one notices.
Like a cat slipping through a room so quietly you never hear it.
The striker ghosted past two defenders and scored.
She seemed to ghost through the hallway without a sound.
UsageSay ghost into or ghost past.
Similarslip, glide, steal, drift
Note
- 14Used before the name of a kind of animal or plant to say it is clear or partly see-through.
You can see right through the ghost shrimp in our fish tank.
The ghost catfish is so clear that you can see its bones.
- 15In a racing game, a copy of an earlier run that you race against to beat your best time.
Like racing against a video of yourself from yesterday.
She raced against the ghost to beat her old lap time.
The ghost showed exactly where he braked too early.
Note
- 16To gray out a button or option to show that it cannot be used.
Like turning a switch gray so you know it won't work right now.
The app will ghost the 'Send' button until you fill in the address.
They ghosted the menu options that free users can't access.
UsageYou often see ghosted, as in a ghosted button.
Note
- 17A person who cannot be identified because there are no official records of them.
Like someone who left no footprints at all, so nobody can prove they were ever there.
To the police, the suspect was a ghost with no name and no history.
Without a birth certificate, he lived as a ghost for years.
- 18A dead person whose name and identity are taken and used by someone else.
Like wearing a dead stranger's name as if it were your own.
The spy used the name of a ghost, a baby who died long ago.
Detectives realized the passport belonged to a ghost, a man dead for thirty years.
- 19
- 20Someone or something that takes another's place when needed.
Similarsubstitute, understudy, stand-in
Note
- 21
- 22
- 23An exact copy of a computer file or record.
Like making a photocopy so you still have the page if you lose the first one.
The IT team made a ghost of her hard drive before the repair.
When the laptop crashed, they restored everything from a ghost.
Similarbackup
Note
- 24
- 25A word game where players add letters one at a time, trying not to finish a real word.
Like a spelling game of dare, where finishing a word means you lose.
We played ghost on the long car ride to keep the kids busy.
He lost at ghost by accidentally finishing the word 'cart.'
- 26To appear in a place and haunt it, used about the spirit of a dead person.
Like a faint shape that keeps appearing in the same dark hallway.
Legend says a drowned bride ghosts the lonely chapel each winter.
The old soldiers believed fallen comrades would ghost the battlefield.
Similarhaunt
Note
- 27On IRC, a user who still shows as online after their connection drops without telling the server.
- 28A faint mark left after graffiti is cleaned off.
- 29In physics, a state appearing in gauge theories that does not exist in the real world.
- 30A computer character added to a standard by mistake, not from real writing.
- 31To make something look pale and faint, like a spirit.
- 32To keep bothering someone, often by staying in their thoughts.
- 33To force someone off IRC for using the nickname you registered.
- 34To move someone in jail to a new jail, usually without telling them first.
- 35To write, create, or perform something for someone else who gets the credit.
- 36Of a sailboat, to move when there is almost no wind.
Showing meanings only.
Practice
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Origin
The noun comes from Old English gāst, meaning breath, spirit, or soul. The 'h' in the spelling appeared later, probably influenced by Middle Dutch gheest. The adjective and verb come from the noun.
Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 4 facts
- The noun derives from Old English gāst, meaning breath, spirit, or soul. en.wikipedia.org
- The h was added later to the spelling. en.wiktionary.org
- The spelling was probably influenced by Middle Dutch gheest. en.wikipedia.org
- The adjective and verb derive from the noun. en.wiktionary.org