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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

inadequate.

Not adequate; lacking in quality or quantity required; insufficient for a purpose.

10 characters4 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

adj/ɪnˈædəkwɪt/

  1. Not adequate; lacking in quality or quantity required; insufficient for a purpose.

    inadequate resources
    inadequate representation
Where this word comes from

Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *né Proto-Indo-European *n̥- Proto-Italic *n̥- Latin in-bor. Middle English in- English in- Proto-Indo-European *h₂éd Proto-Italic *ad Proto-Italic *ad- Latin ad- Proto-Italic *aikʷos? Old Latin aiquos Latin aequus Proto-Indo-European *-h₂ Proto-Indo-European *-éh₂ Proto-Indo-European *-yéti Proto-Indo-European *-eh₂yéti Proto-Indo-European *-h₂tiinflu. Proto-Italic *-ājō Proto-Italic *-āō Latin -ō Latin aequō Latin adaequō Latin adaequātuslbor. English adequate English inadequate From in- + adequate.

noun/ɪnˈædəkwɪt/

  1. A person who is inadequate.

Where this word comes from

Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *né Proto-Indo-European *n̥- Proto-Italic *n̥- Latin in-bor. Middle English in- English in- Proto-Indo-European *h₂éd Proto-Italic *ad Proto-Italic *ad- Latin ad- Proto-Italic *aikʷos? Old Latin aiquos Latin aequus Proto-Indo-European *-h₂ Proto-Indo-European *-éh₂ Proto-Indo-European *-yéti Proto-Indo-European *-eh₂yéti Proto-Indo-European *-h₂tiinflu. Proto-Italic *-ājō Proto-Italic *-āō Latin -ō Latin aequō Latin adaequō Latin adaequātuslbor. English adequate English inadequate From in- + adequate.

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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.