# weight
## English
### Alternative forms

* waight (obsolete)

### Etymology

From Middle English weight, weiȝte, weght, wight, from Old English wiht, ġewiht (“weight”), from Proto-Germanic *wihtiz ("weight"; compare *weganą (“to move”)), from Proto-Indo-European *weǵʰ- (“to move; pull; draw; drive”). Equivalent to weigh +‎ -th.
Cognate with Scots wecht, weicht (“weight”), Saterland Frisian Wächte (“scale”), Gewicht (“weight”), West Frisian gewicht (“weight”), Dutch gewicht (“weight”), German Low German Wicht, Gewicht (“weight”), German Wucht (“massiveness, force”), Gewicht (“weight”).

### Pronunciation

* enPR: wāt, IPA: /weɪt/
* Audio (US):(file)
* Rhymes: -eɪt
* Homophone: wait

### Noun

weight (countable and uncountable, plural weights)
* The downwards force an object experiences due to gravity.
* An object used to make something heavier.
* A standardized block of metal used in a balance to measure the mass of another object.
* (figurative) Importance or influence.
** 1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter I, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC:I liked the man for his own sake, and even had he promised to turn out a celebrity it would have had no weight with me. I look upon notoriety with the same indifference as on the buttons on a man's shirt-front, or the crest on his note-paper.
** 1907 Alonso de Espinosa, Hakluyt Society & Sir Clements Robert Markham, The Guanches of Tenerife: the holy image of Our Lady of Candelaria, and the Spanish conquest and settlement, Printed for the Hakluyt Society, p116
    Another knight came to settle on the island, a man of much weight and position, on whom the Adelantados of all the island relied, and who was made a magistrate.
** 1945, Mikia Pezas, The price of liberty, I. Washburn, Inc., page 11:"You surely are a man of some weight around here," I said.
* (weightlifting) An object, such as a weight plate or barbell, used for strength training.
    He's working out with weights.
* (lubricants) Viscosity rating.
* (physics) Mass (atomic weight, molecular weight, etc.) (in restricted circumstances).
* (physics, proscribed) Synonym of mass (in general circumstances).
* (measurement) Mass (net weight, troy weight, carat weight, etc.).
* (statistics) A variable which multiplies a value for ease of statistical manipulation.
* (topology) The smallest cardinality of a base.
* (typography) The boldness of a font; the relative thickness of its strokes.
    font weight
* (visual art) The relative thickness of a drawn rule or painted brushstroke, line weight.
* (visual art) The illusion of mass.
* (visual art) The thickness and opacity of paint.
* The thickness of yarn.
** 2011 August 23, Carmen Heffernan, “How to make colourful crocheted flowers”, in The Guardian‎:If you'd like to use a different weight of yarn, just check the label for the recommended crochet hook size and use that.
* (figurative) Pressure; burden.
    the weight of care or business
** c. 1603–1606, William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of King Lear”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene iii], page 309, column 2:The waight of this ſad time we muſt obey […]
** 1671, John Milton, “The Second Book”, in Paradise Regain’d. A Poem. In IV Books. To which is Added, Samson Agonistes, London: […] J[ohn] M[acock] for John Starkey […], →OCLC:For the public all this weight he bears.
* The resistance against which a machine acts, as opposed to the power which moves it.
* (slang, uncountable) Shipments of (often illegal) drugs.
    He was pushing weight.
** 2006, Noire [pseudonym], Thug-A-Licious: An Urban Erotic Tale, New York, N.Y.: One World, Ballantine Books, →ISBN, page 103:The three of us were hanging out rapping in Hamilton projects with some niggahs Pimp had got tight with on Rikers Island. Them fools had done a push-in and took over some old lady's apartment, and they were in there cutting crack and mixing weight.
* (slang, countable) One pound of drugs, especially cannabis.
** 2002, Nicholas Dorn, Karim Murji, Nigel South, Traffickers: Drug Markets and Law Enforcement, page 5:[I was] doing a weight [1 lb. at that time] a week, sometimes more, sometimes less.
** 2009, Martina Cole, The Ladykiller:The ones the CIB should be looking out for, to her mind, were the officers who raided a flat, found a couple of weights of cannabis and stashed half of it before they made the collar. The cannabis would make its way back on to the street […]
* (criminal slang, dated) Money.
** 1974, Martin R. Haskell, Lewis Yablonsky, Crime and Delinquency, page 96:No matter how much money he makes, he is still a soldier, but he has the weight.
* Weight class
** 1848 November – 1850 December, William Makepeace Thackeray, The History of Pendennis. […], volume (please specify |volume=I or II), London: Bradbury and Evans, […], published 1849–1850, →OCLC:You’re no match for ’em. You ain’t up to their weight. It’s like little Black Strap standing up to Tom Spring,—the Black’s a pretty fighter but, Law bless you, his arm ain’t long enough to touch Tom,—and I tell you, you’re going it with fellers beyond your weight.
* (especially in computing) Emphasis applied to a given criterion.
** 2024, Laura Masbruch, Pasta Land:“Logits” are the vectors of weights.
** 2017, Up and Atom, Machine Learning Explained in 5 Minutes:Even though it's got its two features of color and hardness, it doesn't know how much importance or, as computer scientists say, weight to place on each of them.

#### Alternative forms

* wt. (abbreviation)

#### Coordinate terms

* mass
* inertial mass
* gravitational mass

#### Derived terms

* absolute weight
* all-up weight
* Aran weight
* axle weight, axleweight
* baby weight
* balance weight, balanceweight
* bantamweight
* birth weight
* biscuit weight
* biweight
* body weight, bodyweight
* carcass weight
* carry one's own weight
* carry one's weight
* carry weight
* casting weight
* coin weight
* combining weight
* counterweight
* curb weight
* dead weight
* draw weight
* dry weight
* equal weight
* equivalent weight
* featherweight
* flyweight
* free weight
* gain weight
* give weight
* gram-molecular weight
* gross vehicle weight rating
* gross weight
* heavyweight
* hit above one's weight
* hit below one's weight
* kerb weight
* lightweight
* light-weight
* live weight
* lose weight
* molecular-weight
* must weight
* neat weight
* net weight
* non-weight-bearing
* overweight
* paperweight
* pseudoweight
* pull one's own weight
* pull one's weight
* punch above one's weight
* punch below one's weight
* put on weight
* sash weight
* short weight
* syllable weight
* take the weight off
* take the weight off one's feet
* throw one's weight around
* throw one's weight behind
* throw-weight
* topweight
* triweight
* underweight
* weight bar
* weight bear
* weight-bear
* weight-bearing
* weight class
* weight down
* weight for age
* weightful, weightfully, weightfulness
* weight gain
* weight gainer
* weightless
* weight-lift
* weightlifter
* weight lifter
* weight lifting
* weightlifting
* weight loss
* weight measure
* weight off someone's mind
* weight off someone's shoulders
* weight of the world
* weightometer
* weight rack
* weight room
* weight-saving
* weight stack
* weight-train
* weight training
* weight-watcher
* weight watcher
* weight weenie
* weighty
* welterweight
* welter-weight
* worth one's weight in gold
* worth one's weight in salt
* yo-weight
* yo-yo weight

#### Related terms

* weigh

#### Descendants

* Belizean Creole: wayt
* → Japanese: ウエイト (ueito)
* → Burmese: ဝိတ် (wit)

#### Translations

    The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.

### Verb

weight (third-person singular simple present weights, present participle weighting, simple past and past participle weighted)
* (transitive) To add weight to something; to make something heavier.
** (transitive, dyeing) To load (fabrics) with barite, etc. to increase the weight.
* (transitive) To load, burden or oppress someone.
* (transitive, mathematics) To assign weights to individual statistics.
* (transitive) To bias something; to slant.
** 2020 March 19, Marcus Ashworth, “Cheap Sterling Has Reasons to Be Cheaper”, in The Washington Post‎:The U.K. economy is heavily weighted towards the service sector and the coronavirus pandemic could lead to a 10% fall in gross domestic product in the second quarter, according to economists at Jefferies.
* (transitive, horse racing) To handicap a horse with a specified weight.
* (transitive, sports) To give a certain amount of force to a throw, kick, hit, etc.
** 2008, Tom Valenta, Remember Me, Mrs V?: Caring for My Wife: Her Alzheimer's and Others' Stories‎, ReadHowYouWant:With good peripheral vision he spots his teammate, Ray Evans, lurking in the scoring zone and sweeps a perfectly weighted pass to him.