wetware

Meanings

nounwetware (uncountable)

humorousslanguncountableliteratureThe human brain or mind, likened to a computer part.
… cyberpunk dream to leave behind the fallible "meat" or "wetware" of the body by entering the datasphere ...
2001, Dr. Peter Knight, Conspiracy Culture: From Kennedy to 'The X-Files, Routledge, →ISBN, page 183
2 more examples
What is not understood is the power hunger that resides in what the psychiatrist Kenneth Colby calls the "wetware"— the human brain about which we know very little except that it is composed of about 75 percent water.
1963, Walter Millis, James Real, The Abolition of War, Macmillan, page xv
Over the weekend, an impressive crossword-solving computer program, called Dr. Fill, which I wrote about earlier, matched its digital wits against the wetware of 600 of the nation’s best human solvers at the American Crossword Puzzle Tournament in Brooklyn.
2012 March 18, Steve Lohr, “In Crosswords, It’s Man Over Machine, for Now”, in NYT, retrieved 17 Sep 2012
1. humorousslanguncommonuncountableliteratureOrganic or biological matter in general.
uncountableThe underlying generative code for an organism, as found in the genetic material, in the biochemistry of the cells, or in the architecture of the body’s tissues.

Also see

From wet + -ware (suffix denoting a type of software).

Cite this entry

APA

wetware. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 2, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/wetware

MLA

“wetware.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/wetware. Accessed November 2, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “wetware,” accessed November 2, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/wetware.

Source: wetware on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.