feasible
adjective
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Feasible and Doable
Feasible comes from faire, the French verb meaning “to do.” Doable and feasible therefore originally meant literally the same thing: “capable of being done.” Indeed, doable was formed with -able, the Latin-derived French ending meaning “capable of” combined, in this instance, with do, a word with roots in Old English and one of the most basic and useful of our verbs. Though their respective etymological meanings may overlap, doable and feasible exist more in parallel with each other than as true synonyms. As with most such pairs of words, the Latin-derived term is used when describing more abstract notions. The words most commonly modified by feasible include:
option
alternative
solution
plan
approach
These are words that describe what has yet to be decided or what will be carefully considered. By contrast, doable modifies more concrete terms:
task
thing
target
Feasible is used when an element of abstraction, distance, and technical specificity is needed. The more earthy doable is rarely used in formal writing, and is not found in the works of Shakespeare, the King James Bible, or any of the founding documents of the United States.
This abstract use of feasible also accounts for the word that expresses a putative, conceptual, or hypothetical state: feasibility. Indeed, we frequently encounter “feasibility study” but not “doability study” (although doability is a word that is sometimes used, it hasn’t yet been added to most dictionaries). As long as something is just an idea, it’s feasible. When it’s time for action, we need to find out if it’s doable.
Examples of feasible in a Sentence
Jared M. Diamond, Guns, Germs, and Steel, 1997
… there do not appear to be any remedies for this situation that are at once politically feasible and likely to work.
—Richard A. Posner, Times Literary Supplement, 1 Sept. 1995
The '70s was the era in which it seemed more important, or more feasible, to reform our bodies than to change the world.
—Barbara Ehrenreich, Utne Reader, May/June 1992
The government has now made it feasible for tourists to spend as long as a month in the country …
—Fred C. Shapiro, New Yorker, 22 Oct. 1990
looking for a feasible way to create new jobs
would it be feasible to build a cabin in so short a time?
Sam Woodward, USA Today, 23 Oct. 2025
Sealing off the entire Brightline route or elevating the entire track would simply not be economically feasible for a private company.
—Kaitlyn Tiffany, The Atlantic, 22 Oct. 2025
The building will soon be sold, and at 65, Michael doesn’t see it as feasible to relocate the shop of 30 years.
—Kansas City Star, 22 Oct. 2025
Quantum theorists and experimenters are working within these constraints to find feasible tasks for their devices to show an advantage over the performance of classical computers.
—Dan Garisto, Scientific American, 22 Oct. 2025
See All Example Sentences for feasible
Cite this Entry
“Feasible.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/feasible. Accessed 31 Oct. 2025.
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feasible
adjective
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