alphabetic

A1L1P3H4A1B3E1T1I1C3
/ˌæl.fəˈbɛt.ɪk/

adjective

Of or relating to an alphabet, especially the characters A to Z, both uppercase and lowercase.

Opposite
Less commonScrabble 19

Meanings

adjective

alternative obsolete alphabetick

  1. Of or relating to an alphabet, especially the characters A to Z, both uppercase and lowercase.

    Seycong or his linguistic consultants could use as a model the alphabetic or abugidic scripts of India and Inner Asia […]

    1996, Peter T. Daniels, William Bright, The World's Writing Systems, →ISBN, page 26

    Synonyms: alphabetical

nounalphabetic (plural alphabetics)

plural alphabetics · alternative obsolete alphabetick

  1. An alphabetic character; a letter of the alphabet.

    Upper case alphabetics can be composed of two characters: (1) a shift character; and (2) the desired alphabetic character.

    1960, Peter C. Tosini, Magnetic Drum Directory and Programming System for Codesorting Letter Mail, page 32
    2 more examples

    The natural sequence of alphabetics is A, B, C, ..., X, Y, Z. For some codes, the binary bit patterns of the alphabetics are in the same relative sequence as the alphabetics.

    1980, Charles E. Mackenzie, Coded Character Sets: History and Development, page 33

    Subparagraphs are identified by lower case alphabetics followed by numerics and alphabetics in parentheses and then underlined numerics and alphabetics.

    1987, United States. Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense (Acquisition & Logistics) ·, MILSTAMP TACs, page 15

Synonyms & antonyms

adjectiveOf or relating to an alphabet, especially the characters A to Z, both uppercase and lowercase.

More synonyms by meaning

adjectiverelating to or expressed by a writing system that uses an alphabet

Opposite

adjectivearranged in order according to the alphabet

Opposite

Synonym sets from Open English WordNet, CC BY 4.0.

Origin

  1. Latinalphabēticus
  2. Frenchalphabétique
  3. Englishalphabetic

Partly from French alphabétique and partly from its etymon Latin alphabēticus. By surface analysis, alphabet + -ic.

Full word history & related roots →

Rhymes & wordplay

Rhymes with alphabetic

All rhymes →
Cite this entry
APA

alphabetic. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 2, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/alphabetic

MLA

“alphabetic.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/alphabetic. Accessed November 2, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “alphabetic,” accessed November 2, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/alphabetic.

Source: alphabetic on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.