  Using the gauge/gravity duality we study the imaginary part of the static
potential associated to the thermal width in finite temperature strongly
coupled anisotropic plasma. We firstly derive the potential for a generic
anisotropic background. Then we apply our formulas to a theory where the
anisotropy has been generated by a space dependent axion term. We find that
using our method there exist a peculiar turning point in the imaginary part of
the potential, similar to the one appearing in the real part. The presence of
anisotropy leads to decrease of the imaginary potential, where larger decrease
happens along the anisotropic direction when the temperature is kept fixed.
When the entropy density is fixed, increase happens along the parallel
direction while along the transverse plane we observe a decrease. To estimate
the thermal width we use an approximate extrapolation beyond the turning point
and we find a decrease in presence of the anisotropy, independently of the
comparison scheme used.
