The most common and most likely answer to this crossword clue is the 10 letter word DIFFERENCE
I've seen this crossword clue in The Times
D
I
F
F
E
R
E
N
C
E
More clues leading to the result DIFFERENCE
- Duke providing barrier to limit queen’s dispute?
- Change row
- After Disruption, find Free Church deviation
- Dispute the number left
- Change row
- Redraft in decree outlining very strong argument
- Quarrel very loudly in terrible decree nisi — not half
- What’s left of Diversity?
- Fee finder’s adjusted, retaining a hundred in dispute
- Result of operation – contention
Buddy explains!
The straight part
We know that "dispute" is the straight/definition part of the clue. The straight part is often a synonym or definition, in this case dispute = difference.The cryptic/wordplay part
In cryptic crossword there's often an wordplay/cryptic part as well.This part involves a more complex hint, such as an anagram, homophone, hidden word, etc.
Sadly, We don't have an explanation for this specific crossword clue yet.
What does DIFFERENCE mean?
DIFFERENCE noun- The quality of being different.
- A characteristic of something that makes it different from something else.
- A disagreement or argument.
- Significant change in or effect on a situation or state.
- The result of a subtraction; sometimes the absolute value of this result.
- Choice; preference.
- An addition to a coat of arms to distinguish two people's bearings which would otherwise be the same. See augmentation and cadency.
- The quality or attribute which is added to those of the genus to constitute a species; a differentia.
- (logic circuits) A Boolean operation which is TRUE when the two input variables are different but is otherwise FALSE; the XOR operation (\scriptstyle A \overline B + \overline A B).
- (relational algebra) the set of elements that are in one set but not another (\scriptstyle A \overline B).
- To distinguish or differentiate.