phantom

• fantom (archaic)

Inherited from Middle English fantome, fanteme, from Old French fantosme, fantasme, from Latin phantasma (“an apparition, specter; (in Late Latin also) appearance, image”), from Ancient Greek φάντασμα (phántasma, “phantasm, an appearance, image, apparition, specter”), from φαντάζω (phantázō, “I make visible”). Doublet of phantasm.

• IPA^(key): /ˈfæntəm/

  • Audio (Southern England):

    (file)

• Rhymes: -æntəm
• Hyphenation: phan‧tom

phantom (countable and uncountable, plural phantoms)

1. A ghost or apparition.
2. Something apparently seen, heard, or sensed, but having no physical reality; an image that appears only in the mind; an illusion or delusion.
3. (bridge) A placeholder for a pair of players when there are an odd number of pairs playing.
4. (medical imaging) A test object that reproduces the characteristics of human tissue.
5. (colloquial, uncountable) Short for phantom power

• ghost
• See also Thesaurus:ghost

• fantasy

phantom (not comparable)

1. Illusive.
   • 1899, Stephen Crane, chapter 1, in Twelve O'Clock:

     […] (it was the town's humour to be always gassing of phantom investors who were likely to come any moment and pay a thousand prices for everything) — “[…] Them rich fellers, they don't make no bad breaks with their money. […]”

2. Fictitious or nonexistent.

   a phantom limb

• Douglas Harper (2001–2025) “phantom”, in Online Etymology Dictionary.

• Hampton