noun

• A small wave with a foamy white crest.

  ‘the wind pushed whitecaps across the surface of the water’

  More example sentences

  • ‘The wind was blowing hard, driving big waves before it and occasionally pushing whitecaps over their tops.’
  • ‘The wind was blowing (you can tell from the whitecaps on the waves), the clouds were low, and it was raining.’
  • ‘Far off, other mountain peaks descended into smaller whitecaps and waves of hills that broke against the base of Cadillac Mountain.’
  • ‘If you imagine the ground as the surface of a sea, these waves range from ripples to choppy whitecaps to long, slow swells.’
  • ‘Offshore, breakers swelled in the whitecaps and then crashed in the shallow water, strong enough to body surf for twenty yards.’
  • ‘The wind picked up on Sunday putting some whitecaps on some swells off shore and then mother nature unleashed a storm that was very out of character for this time of year.’
  • ‘The bright colors of their sails flashed across the whitecaps before disappearing in the heavy swells.’
  • ‘The squall that had blown in just as we left the mainland was now peeling spray off the whitecaps, and I was drenched.’
  • ‘Wherever possible, he writes with a seaman's lingo of seaways, gunwales, swells and whitecaps.’
  • ‘Paddling on the river is easy and relaxing - until winds at 30 miles per hour transform the waters into whitecaps breaking over the bow of your little kayak.’
  • ‘The wind lashed the water into a choppy expanse of whitecaps.’
  • ‘‘It's getting rough,’ she observed to herself, seeing whitecaps breaking on the water in the distance.’
  • ‘The blue, blue sea, specked with whitecaps, the dramatic, green-clad peaks, and the colorful beachside villages look (especially from about a mile away) like a dream come true.’
  • ‘Jake accepted the pole from Abby, and the two quietly watched the whitecaps in the bay, while the clouds lazily drifted overhead.’
  • ‘Short, shallow fetches prevent major whitecaps on small bodies of water, and a leeward shoreline always is within reach.’
  • ‘The sky blazed blue, and the ocean glittered with foam from little whitecaps - it was just windy enough to cause them.’
  • ‘Whether a coast is perceived may depend on the height of bird, the amount of moonlight, or presence of whitecaps.’
  • ‘I can see whitecaps out on the water, but the ship rides so smooth that I can hardly tell we're underway.’
  • ‘Two years later I sat in the little town of Loreto watching the whitecaps blow over the ocean.’
  • ‘At high tide, the little bay looks deep and blue and can even develop some modest whitecaps.’

  Synonyms

  breaker, billow, roller, comber, ripple, white horse, white cap