palatable
Americanadjective
-
acceptable or agreeable to the palate or taste; savory.
palatable food.
- Synonyms:
- delectable, delicious
- Antonyms:
- distasteful, tasteless, unsavory, unpalatable
-
acceptable or agreeable to the mind or feelings.
palatable ideas.
- Synonyms:
- satisfactory, pleasing
adjective
-
pleasant to taste
-
acceptable or satisfactory
a palatable suggestion
Related Words
Palatable, appetizing, tasty, savory all refer to tastes or aromas pleasing to the palate and in some cases to the olfactory nerves. Palatable has the least positive connotation of these terms, often referring to food that is merely acceptable and not especially good: a palatable, if undistinguished, main course; a barely palatable mixture of overcooked vegetables. Appetizing suggests stimulation of the appetite by the smell, taste of food, and is the only one of these words that can also refer to food pleasing to the eye: the appetizing aroma of baking bread; the table contained an appetizing display of meats, cheeses, and salads. Tasty refers to food that has a notable or especially appealing taste: mixed with bits of a tasty sausage; an especially tasty sauce. Savory refers most often to well or highly seasoned foods and applies to their appeal in both taste and smell: a savory, succulent roast of beef, spiced with slivers of garlic; the savory aroma of a simmering duck sauce.
Other Word Forms
- nonpalatable adjective
- nonpalatably adverb
- palatability noun
- palatableness noun
- palatably adverb
Etymology
Origin of palatable
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
This so-called “walled garden” model—similar to how a user streams songs only within the platforms of Apple Music or Spotify—has become the more palatable alternative to many.
From The Wall Street Journal • Mar. 28, 2026
So, in an attempt to make yogurt more palatable, companies upped the sweet factor.
From Salon • Mar. 28, 2026
But in the push to legalize same-sex marriage, advocates tended to flatten the experiences and family structures of queer people to make it palatable to the American public.
From Los Angeles Times • Mar. 18, 2026
The group listed Anthropic’s Claude as a more palatable chatbot option.
From MarketWatch • Mar. 2, 2026
My plan, I told him, was simply to effect essentially cosmetic changes in order to make the ANC more intelligible — and more palatable — to our allies.
From "Long Walk to Freedom" by Nelson Mandela
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
