Workable means practical enough to actually succeed or function in real life. A workable plan is one that can genuinely be carried out with the resources and time available. When your teacher asks your group to come up with a workable solution to a class problem, she wants something realistic that will actually work, considering all the real obstacles you'll face.

The word carries a sense of practicality and realism. A workable schedule fits all your activities into the day without requiring you to be in two places at once. A workable compromise between friends gives each person something they need, even if nobody gets everything they wanted. Engineers search for workable designs that can be built with available materials and technology.

Something workable doesn't have to be perfect or ideal. It just needs to function well enough to get the job done. Your first draft of a story might not be brilliant, but if it's workable, you have something solid to improve upon. When people describe an idea as workable, they mean it passes the basic test of reality: yes, this could actually happen.

The opposite would be impractical, unrealistic, or unworkable. A plan to finish a month-long project in one afternoon isn't workable, no matter how appealing it sounds.