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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

debt.

An action, state of mind, or object one has an obligation to perform for another, adopt toward another, or give to another.

4 characters1 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/ˈdɛt/[ˈdɛt]/ˈdɛbt//ˈdɛp(t)/
  1. An action, state of mind, or object one has an obligation to perform for another, adopt toward another, or give to another.

    countable · uncountable
  2. The state or condition of owing something to another.

    countable · uncountable
    I am in your debt.
    We owe them a debt of gratitude for taking care of our pets.
  3. Money that one person or entity owes or is required to pay to another, generally as a result of a loan or other financial transaction.

    countable · uncountable
  4. An action at law to recover a certain specified sum of money alleged to be due

    countable · uncountable
Where this word comes from

From Middle English dette, dett, borrowed from Old French dete (French dette), from Medieval Latin dēbita, from Latin dēbitum (“what is owed, a debt, a duty”), neuter of dēbitus, perfect passive participle of dēbeō (“to owe”), contraction of *dehibeō (“I have from”), from de (“from”) + habeō (“to have”). Doublet of debit. Displaced native Old English eofot. The unpronounced "b" in the modern English spelling is a Latinisation from the Latin etymon dēbitum.

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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.