Pro-Choice is the preferred self-description of people who believe that a woman should have the freedom to terminate a pregnancy by having an abortion if she does not want to have a baby. The term reflects the belief that termination of pregnacy should be solely the choice of the pregnant woman.

Some opponents of abortion refer to people who are pro-choice on abortion as "anti-life" or "pro-abortion." Pro-choice individuals generally object to this nomenclature, and frequently claim that calling them pro-abortion is inaccurate because they are not necessarily in favor of abortion, but rather in favor of the legal right to choose abortion, as part of the broader category of reproductive rights. However, opponents of abortion argue that "pro-choice" is a misnomer, because pro-choice activists fiercely oppose legislative reforms which facilitate choices other than abortion, such as "Informed Consent" or "Right To Know" laws, even when such laws do not restrict a woman's legal right to choose abortion. Some medical practitioners, and many advocates of a female patient's right to choose abortion, consider informed consent restrictions an inconsistent and arbitrary governmental intrusion into an open, informed and confidential patient-practitioner relationship. They argue that since informed consent is the precursor to all medical treatment, any legislative requirement for additional "facilitation" in this instance amounts to a compromise to the physician's or practitioner's skill and discretion.

The Oxford English Dictionary lists the usage of "pro-choice" at least as early as 1975, around the time when the question of the legality of abortion became increasingly discussed after Roe v. Wade (the term "choice" is used to describe options towards abortion in the case as well).

Within the term of Pro-Choice exists a spectrum of political opinion, ranging from the view that all abortions should be legal, to the view that abortions should only be legal until a certain date in the progression of the pregnancy (such as the third trimester, which was the approximate gestational age at which a fetus could survive outside of the mother's body when Roe v. Wade was decided, in 1973).

People who believe the opposite refer to themselves as Pro-Life. Within that term also exists a spectrum of political opinion, ranging from the view that all abortions should be illegal, to the view that abortion should only be legal in certain rare circumstances, such as pregnancy by rape or incest, or when there are fetal deformities or medical complications to pregnancy.

NARAL Pro-Choice America is the leading pro-choice advocacy and lobbying group in the United States, though most of the major feminist organizations are involved in the issue on the pro-choice side as well.

To some, "Pro-Choice" is a loaded term: it contains the connotations that people who oppose the political opinions it describes are against "choice", which is a highly valued concept in the United States and Western world. Both "Pro-Life" and "Pro-Choice" are examples of political framing: they are terms which purposely try to define their philosophies in the best possible light, while by definition attempting to describe their opposition in the worst possible light (being anti-life or anti-choice).

In the United States, the Democratic Party tends to be more "Pro-Choice" than the Republican Party on the issue of abortion.

See also

• Morality and legality of abortion
• Pro-Life

Other possible meanings

"Pro-choice" can also refer to support of a right to choose on many other issues, including suicide, the recreational use of drugs, topfree equality, and, in the United States, the movement to allow workers to opt-out of Social Security.

In the context of education, the term "pro-choice" refers to the idea that parents should be allowed to choose their own child's school. People who are "pro-choice on education" believe that if a child's parents choose an option other than the local public school for their child's education, such as a private school or a different public school, then some or all of the money which would otherwise have been expended to educate that child in the local public school should be made available to defray the cost of tuition elsewhere, through a mechanism such as vouchers or tuition tax credits. In the United States, on the issue of school choice and in contrast to the issue of abortion, the Republican Party tends to be more "pro-choice on education" than the Democratic Party.