despicable
/dɪˈspɪkəbəl/adjective, noun
despicable is spelled D-E-S-P-I-C-A-B-L-E. The wrong spelling people search most is dispicable: about 430 Bing searches a month in the United States (September 2025 to August 2026), about 2 in 10 of all searches for the word. Despicable is an adjective meaning “Fit or deserving to be despised; contemptible; mean”.
How many letters and syllables are in despicable?
| Letters | 10: D-E-S-P-I-C-A-B-L-E |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 4 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | 2.9 times per million words; the 15,798th most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | 3; the most searched, dispicable, about 430 Bing searches a month (all of them) |
Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation and the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary; written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media); Bing searches in the United States: the average month from September 2025 to August 2026 (Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, read September 30, 2026).
How do you spell despicable?
Despicable is spelled D-E-S-P-I-C-A-B-L-E. 3 wrong spellings are searched or written often enough to measure; together they are about 2 in 10 of the searches for despicable in either form.
Bing searches in the United States: the average month from September 2025 to August 2026 (Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, read September 30, 2026). Wrong spellings are taken from Wiktionary entries tagged "misspelling" and its obsolete or nonstandard forms, Wikipedia's Lists of common misspellings and the codespell dictionary, then measured. The proofreader's marks show the change that corrects each one.
How common is despicable?
Despicable appears 2.9 times per million words in written English, the 15,798th most frequent word form in the list.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
How do you pronounce despicable?
- /dɪˈspɪkəbəl/
- /ˈdɛspɪkəbəl/
Despicable has 4 syllables (counted from its American pronunciation in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: LL-Q1860_(eng)-Vealhurl-despicable.wav, LL-Q1860_(eng)-Simplificationalizer-despicable.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Forms of despicable
- more despicable comparative
- most despicable superlative
- despicables plural
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does despicable mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
adjective
- 1
Fit or deserving to be despised; contemptible; mean.
noun
- 1
A wretched or wicked person.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Despicable in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense deserving to be despised:
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | abject, détestable, méprisable |
| German | verachtenswert, gemein, niederträchtig, verabscheuungswürdig, widerwärtig, abscheulich |
| Portuguese | desprezível |
| Spanish | desdeñable, despreciable, bajo, rastrero, deleznable, ruin |
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.
Where does despicable come from?
From Late Latin dēspicābilis, from Latin dēspicor, a variant of dēspiciō (“to despise”), from de (“down”) + speciō (“to look at, behold”). First attested in the 1550s. Equivalent to despise + -able.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).