Inexplicable or unexplainable?
inexplicable is an adjective meaning “Impossible to explain; not easily accounted for”; unexplainable is an adjective meaning “That doesn't have a known or readily available explanation”. In written English (wordfreq, 2021 data) inexplicable is about 3.5 times as common as unexplainable.
What is the difference between inexplicable and unexplainable?
| inexplicable | unexplainable | |
|---|---|---|
| Part of speech | adjective, noun | adjective |
| Meaning | Impossible to explain; not easily accounted for Something that is impossible to explain | That doesn't have a known or readily available explanation |
| Example | none recorded | none recorded |
| Pronunciation | /ˌɪn.ɪkˈsplɪ.kə.bl̩/ /ɪnˈɛk.splɪ.kə.bəl/ | /ˌʌn.ɛksˈpleɪ.nə.bl̩/ |
| In writing | 1.3 times per million words | about once in every 3 million words |
Sources: inexplicable and unexplainable in the English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0); written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
Every current meaning of inexplicable and unexplainable
inexplicable
- 1
Impossible to explain; not easily accounted for
- 2
Something that is impossible to explain
unexplainable
- 1
That doesn't have a known or readily available explanation
Source: the English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0); obsolete, archaic, dialect and rare senses left out.
Which is more common, inexplicable or unexplainable?
inexplicable appears 1.3 times per million words; unexplainable about once in every 3 million words.
inexplicable 1.3 times per million wordsunexplainable about once in every 3 million words
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
How many people search inexplicable vs unexplainable?
“inexplicable vs unexplainable” is searched about 880 times a month on Google and 20 on Bing in the United States. Google counts close variants of a query together (“unexplainable vs inexplicable”, “inexplicable or unexplainable”).
Sources: Google Ads keyword data through DataForSEO and Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, the average month from September 2025 to August 2026.