Accessible

How to spell accessible

10 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce accessible

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does accessible mean?

1. adjectiveAble to be reached, entered, obtained, or understood without difficulty.

Accessible in a sentence

• The new lift makes every floor of the building accessible to wheelchair users.

• The report was written in plain language so the findings stay accessible to ordinary readers.

Where does accessible come from?

Language of origin: Latin

The word traces back to the Latin accessibilis, meaning 'that may be approached or reached'. That adjective was built on the verb accedere, 'to come near' or 'to approach', which itself joins the prefix ad- ('to, toward') with the verb cedere ('to go' or 'to yield'). The same cedere root quietly powers a whole family of English words, including 'proceed', 'recede', 'concede' and 'access' itself, all of them carrying the idea of going or moving. English took accessible in through French and Late Latin in the 1400s, first in the literal sense of a place one could physically reach. Over the centuries it broadened to mean anything easy to obtain, understand or use, and in modern times it carries the important sense of being usable by people with disabilities. The spelling trap lives in two places: the doubled c that survives from the Latin ad- assimilating before the c, and the -ible ending that writers so often want to swap for -able.

How the word is built

• ac- (from ad-: to, toward)
• cess (from cedere: to go, approach)
• -ible (capable of being)