"Inexplicable" vs. "unexplainable": are they really the same?

Reviewed and edited by

Anwar Kareem 05/11/2025, 19:19

English.me team member

Inexplicable and unexplainable. What's the difference?

What is similar?

Both words describe something that cannot be explained or understood. They are often used interchangeably in everyday language and express the idea that a phenomenon, action, or event defies explanation or logic.

What is different?

Inexplicable tends to imply an intrinsic or inherent quality of being impossible to explain, often suggesting that the reason is fundamentally beyond understanding. Unexplainable emphasizes the inability to find or provide an explanation, which could be due to practical limitations, lack of information, or complexity, rather than inherent impossibility.

Which one is more common?

Examples of usage

Inexplicable

She felt an inexplicable sense of dread before entering the room.
The sudden power outage was completely inexplicable to the engineers.
There was an inexplicable beauty in the silent, snow-covered landscape.

Unexplainable

The scientist encountered an unexplainable result in his experiments.
His happiness was unexplainable given the difficult circumstances.
Several unexplainable noises kept the family awake at night.