Incompetence vs Incapacity - What's the difference?

incompetence | incapacity | Related terms |

Incompetence is a related term of incapacity.

As nouns the difference between incompetence and incapacity

is that incompetence is incompetence while incapacity is the lack of a capacity; an inability.

incompetence

English

Noun

(-)

Inability to perform; lack of competence; ineptitude.

* 1851:

... at the head of a crew, too, chiefly made up of mongrel renegades, and castaways, and cannibals--morally enfeebled also, by the incompetence of mere unaided virtue or right-mindedness in Starbuck

* 1949:

Winston did not know why Withers had been disgraced. Perhaps it was for corruption or incompetence . Perhaps Big Brother was merely getting rid of a too-popular subordinate.

* 1974:

The factory where she worked was a poisonous mass of incompetence , favoritism, and sabotage.

incapacity

English

Noun

(incapacities)

The lack of a capacity; an inability

* 1605: Francis Bacon, The Advancement of Learning

So that it is not the insufficiency or incapacity of man's mind, but it is the remote standing or placing thereof that breedeth these mazes and incomprehensions;