Advisable

How to spell advisable

9 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce advisable

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does advisable mean?

1. adjectiveSensible or worth doing in the circumstances; recommended as a wise course of action.

Advisable in a sentence

• It is advisable to book the flights well before the holiday rush.

• The lawyer said it was not advisable to sign the contract without reading it.

Where does advisable come from?

Language of origin: French

This word grows out of the verb 'advise', which English took from the Old French 'aviser', meaning 'to consider', 'to reflect', or 'to give counsel'. That French verb traces back through Late Latin to the phrase 'ad visum', built from 'ad' meaning 'to' and 'visum', a form of 'videre' meaning 'to see', so the underlying idea was literally 'to bring something into view' or 'to see how a matter stands' before acting. By the time the verb settled into English in the 1300s the sense of considered counsel was firmly attached. The adjective 'advisable' was then formed by adding the suffix '-able', meaning 'worthy of' or 'fit to be', so it describes a course of action that is worth being advised. The same 'videre' root for 'seeing' also lurks in everyday relatives such as 'vision', 'visible', and 'supervise', and the spelling trap here is that the silent final 'e' of 'advise' is dropped before '-able' is added.

How the word is built

• advis- (from advise: to counsel)
• -able (capable of, worthy of)