Unserviceable

adj

adj ·5 syllables ·Uncommon ·Advanced level

Definitions

Adjective
  1. 1
    Unusable; of no use. not-comparable

    "1591, Walter Raleigh, A Report of the Truth of the Fight about the Iles of Açores, this last Sommer betwixt the Reuenge, one of her Maiesties Shippes, and an Armada of the King of Spaine, London: William Ponsonbie; Riverside Press, 1902, And that which was most to our disaduantage, the one halfe part of the men of euerie shippe sicke, and vtterly vnseruiceable."

  2. 2
    Of machinery, etc.: not working. not-comparable

    "During 1936, revealed Pravda, the Gorky plant set itself the task of turning out 12,000 cars. The actual output was 2,500. In one day 24 of 47 cars turned out were tagged “unserviceable.”"

  3. 3
    Impractical. not-comparable
Adjective
  1. 1
    not ready for service wordnet
  2. 2
    not capable of being used wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms
inoperablebroken downburned outfunctionlessimpracticableimpractical

Example

More examples

"The village of San José at Himuri is three leagues to the east of San Ignacio. It is bordered on the east and on the north by the mountains. It is blessed with good lands but the Indians work very little or not at all at farming them. The church and house of the Missionary are nearly in ruins. The ornaments for the altar and divine services have dwindled to one chalice, three chasubles, two albs, three amices, and other adornments, all very old and almost unserviceable. According to the Census Book, which I have here before me, there are seven married couples, six widowers, nine orphans, the number of souls in all thirty-nine."

Etymology

From un- + serviceable.

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