• twenty-third letter of the Latin alphabet, eighteenth consonant
  • phonetic name: "voiced bilabial semivowel"; pucker your lips into a circle and make a sound from your vocal chords as your release the tension in your lips (n.b.: W is one of the few letters whose name does not match its sound AND the only letter name with more than one syllable)
  • Egyptian hieroglyph was a small quail
  • W only appears around the twelfth century, first as UU, the UV, and then later as VV
  • W was reluctantly accepted in the French alphabet in the late 18th century; "We may say that this letter belongs in no way to the French alphabet; for although it may be pronounced sometimes as [v] and sometimes as [w], it hardly attains the genius of our language." -1839 French dictionary
  • French printers later began to prefer the double V shape
  • the english W ("double-u") evokes the earlier handwritten form; the French W (which translates literally as "double-v") refers more to the print shape
  • W is represented as either two linked (an upside down M) or overlapping Vs
  • W is usually the Widest letter in standard typefaces
  • W can be silent (two, answer)
  • W is a vowel in Welsh language
  • W in the Finnish alphabet is still seen as a variant of V and not a separate letter
  • In Arabic, W is written using the penultimate letter of the alphabet, waw
  • associated with water and duplication
  • the shape of W is closely tied to pictograms of water (n.b.: it is also the first letter of the words "water" and "wet")
  • W on a map, compass or weather map is West
  • W wants to know all the answers: who, what, when, where, and why?
  • in electricity, W stands for watt, a unit of mechanical or electrical power
  • in radio, W band ranges from 75 to 111 GHz
  • in physics, W is the symbol for mechanical work
  • W is also associate with George W. (Dubya) Bush, 43rd President of the United States
  • W is an American women's fashion magazine
  • W is the amino acid associated with turkey meat and drowsiness (which is a myth)
  • W can also abbreviate Wales, warden, Wednesday, weekly, weight, western, wide, width, widow, wife, with, work
  • double W (WW) abbreviates World War (WWI, WWII)
  • triple W (WWW) stands for world wide web
  • W is the chemical symbol for tungsten (#74 on the periodic table), a gray metal that has the highest melting point and lowest vapour pressure of all metals, and also has excellent corrosion resistance properties.
  • NATO phonetic alphabet: WHISKEY
  • "The sound vibration of the consonant 'W' means 'two ways of descending light'." - Joseph E. Rael