Unfavorable or unfavourable?
In American English write unfavorable; in British and Commonwealth English, unfavourable. unfavorable is an adjective meaning “US standard spelling of unfavourable”; unfavourable is an adjective meaning “Serving to hinder or oppose; adverse, disadvantageous, inconducive, unsuitable”. In written English (wordfreq, 2021 data) unfavorable is about 2.6 times as common as unfavourable.
What is the difference between unfavorable and unfavourable?
| unfavorable | unfavourable | |
|---|---|---|
| Part of speech | adjective | adjective |
| Meaning | USUS standard spelling of unfavourable | UKServing to hinder or oppose; adverse, disadvantageous, inconducive, unsuitable UKNot auspicious; ill-boding |
| Example | none recorded | none recorded |
| Pronunciation | not recorded | not recorded |
| Region | US | UK |
| In writing | 1.6 times per million words | about once in every 2 million words |
Sources: unfavorable and unfavourable 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 unfavorable and unfavourable
unfavorable
- 1
USUS standard spelling of unfavourable
unfavourable
- 1
UKServing to hinder or oppose; adverse, disadvantageous, inconducive, unsuitable
- 2
UKNot auspicious; ill-boding
- 3
UKOf a belief, state of mind, etc.: not favourable; disapproving
- 4
UKOf wind or weather: causing delay or obstacles; not conducive to travel or work; inclement
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, unfavorable or unfavourable?
unfavorable appears 1.6 times per million words; unfavourable about once in every 2 million words.
unfavorable 1.6 times per million wordsunfavourable about once in every 2 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 unfavorable vs unfavourable?
“unfavorable vs unfavourable” is searched about 10 times a month on Google (Bing reports no separate figure) in the United States. Google counts close variants of a query together (“unfavourable vs unfavorable”, “unfavorable or unfavourable”).
Sources: Google Ads keyword data through DataForSEO and Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, the average month from September 2025 to August 2026.