Debatable

adj, noun

adj, noun ·4 syllables ·Uncommon ·College level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    A topic that is open to debate.

    "Just how many glaucoma patients there are in the United States and just how prevalent is the disease are two unknowns or at least two debatables."

Adjective
  1. 1
    Open to debate; not fully proved or confirmed.

    "Those data are debatable: no one has been able to replicate them."

  2. 2
    Able to be debated; up for discussion.

    "The lack of bonuses this year is not debatable."

Adjective
  1. 1
    capable of being disproved wordnet
  2. 2
    open to argument or debate wordnet
  3. 3
    open to doubt or debate wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms
controversialdisputableproblematicquestionablearguablearguable

Antonyms

All antonyms
cogent

Example

More examples

"Accept it or not, this is a debatable view."

Etymology

From Old French debatable (French débattable), equivalent to debate + -able.

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.