The abortion debate is a longstanding and contentious discourse that touches on the moral, legal, medical, and religious aspects of induced abortion. In English-speaking countries, the debate has two major sides, commonly referred to as the "pro-choice" and "pro-life" movements. Generally, supporters of pro-choice argue for the right to choose to terminate a pregnancy. They take into account various factors such as the stage of fetal development, the health of the woman, and the circumstances of the conception. By comparison, the supporters of pro-life generally argue that a fetus is a human being with inherent rights and intrinsic value, and thus, cannot be overridden by the woman's choice or circumstances and that abortion is morally wrong in most or all cases. Both the terms pro-choice and pro-life are considered loaded words in mainstream media, which tend to prefer terms such as "abortion rights" or "anti-abortion" as more neutral and avoidant of bias.

Each movement has had varying results in influencing public opinion and attaining legal support for its position. Supporters and opponents of abortion often argue that it is essentially a moral issue, concerning the beginning of human personhood, rights of the fetus, and bodily integrity. Additionally, some argue that government involvement in abortion-related decisions, particularly through public funding, raises ethical and political questions. Libertarians, for example, may oppose taxpayer funding for abortion based on principles of limited government and personal responsibility, while holding diverse views on the legality of the procedure itself. The debate has become a political and legal issue in some countries with those who oppose abortion seeking to enact, maintain, and expand anti-abortion laws, while those who support abortion seek to repeal or ease such laws and expand access to the procedure. Abortion laws vary considerably between jurisdictions, ranging from outright prohibition of the procedure to public funding of abortion. The availability of abortion procedures considered safe also varies across the world and exists mainly in places that legalize abortion.

In ancient times, issues such as abortion and infanticide were evaluated by patriarchies within the contexts of family planning, gender selection, population control, and property rights. The rights of the prospective mother and child were typically not central to these considerations. Ancient discourse often expressed the concerns on the nature of humankind, the existence of a soul, when life begins, and the beginning of human personhood, issues that are still relevant even today.

Discussion of the presumed personhood of a fetus may be complicated by the current legal status of children. Similar to minors, fetuses and embryos lack certain legal capacities. In many legal systems, a fetus or an embryo does not have the same legal status as a person. They have not reached the age of majority and deemed not able to enter into contracts and to sue or be sued. Since the 1860s, they have been treated as persons for the limited purposes of offence against the person law in the UK including Northern Ireland, although this treatment was amended by the Abortion Act of 1967 in England, Scotland, and Wales. In America, there have been logistical challenges in considering a fetus as a person. Some legal interpretations have argued that if a fetus is considered a person, then it is only under certain conditions as it relies on the body of another person and is usually not the object of direct action by another person. In the current debate, proposals range from prohibitions on abortion in all cases, even when the woman's life is at risk, to calls for complete legalization with provisions for public funding.

Many of the terms used in the debate are seen as political framing: terms used to validate one's stance while invalidating the opposition's. For example, the labels "pro-choice" and "pro-life" imply widely held values such as liberty or the right to life, while suggesting that the opposition must be "anti-choice" or "anti-life". Terms used in the debate to describe their opponents consist of "pro-abortion", "pro-abort"; however, these terms do not always reflect a political view or fall along a binary. Seven in ten Americans described themselves as "pro-choice" while almost two-thirds described themselves as "pro-life". Another identifier in the debate is "abolitionist", which harks back to the 19th-century struggle against human slavery.

Francis Beckwith argues that even seemingly neutral phrases like "abortion rights" are ideologically loaded. He contends that such language presupposes the moral legitimacy of abortion by framing it as a fundamental right, thereby sidestepping the underlying philosophical question of whether the unborn possess a right to life. In doing so, the term shapes public discourse by implicitly framing abortion access as presumptively justified.

Appeals are often made in the abortion debate to the rights of the fetus, pregnant woman, or other parties. Such appeals can generate confusion if the type of rights is not specified (whether civil, natural, or otherwise) or if it is simply assumed that the right appealed to takes precedence over all other competing rights (an example of begging the question). The appropriate terms to designate the human organism before birth are also debated. Some anti-abortion supporters regard the technical terminology "embryo" and "fetus" as dehumanizing, whereas some abortion rights proponents regard ordinary terms such as "baby" or "child" as emotion-inducing.

The use of the term "baby" to describe the unborn human organism is seen by some scholars as part of an effort to assign the organism agency, functioning to further the construction of fetal personhood. Anti-abortion activists occasionally use the term "the silent holocaust" or "the American genocide" about the number of abortions that have been performed in the United States since 1973.