Word.ws English Dictionary

butterfingered

Syllables: but·ter·fing·ered/ˈbʌtəˌfɪŋɡəd/US/ˈbʌtɚˌfɪŋɡɚd/

butterfingered adjective: prone to dropping things; clumsy.

Adjective

butterfingered (comparative more butterfingered, superlative most butterfingered)

  1. Prone to dropping things; clumsy.
    • [S]hee [a housewife] muſt be cleanly both in body and garments, ſhe muſt haue a quicke eye, a curious noſe, a perfect taſte and a ready care (ſhe muſt not be butter fingered, ſweet-toothed, nor faint hearted); for, the firſt will let euery thing fall, the ſecond will conſume what it ſhould...1615, G[ervase] M[arkham], “[The English Hus-wife.] Of the Outward and Actiue Knowledges of the Hous-wife; and First of Her Skill in Cookery.”, in Countrey Contentments, in Two Bookes: The First...
    • There are few who are ignorant of the circumstance which occurred at the execution of [Arthur] Thistlewood and his fellow conspirators for treason. A thrill of horror ran through the crowd when the first head was severed from its body, but so rapidly did the spectators become accustomed to the...1858 January, “Art. VI.—An Essay on the Beneficent Distribution of the Sense of Pain. By G. A. Rowell, […] Oxford, 1857.”, in The London Quarterly Review, American edition, volume XLIX, number I...

Examples of butterfingered in a sentence

  • But their passing game was anemic and they had butterfingered receivers, who dropped passes and fumbled the ball with alarming regularity.2006, Matthew Algeo, “Birds of Steel”, in Last Team Standing: How the Steelers and the Eagles—“the Steagles”—Saved Pro Football during...
  • He watches the team faithfully on television, shouting his approval at the rectangular set or cursing the errors and fumbles of the butterfingered local nine or eleven or six or five.2012, James T. Bennett, “Introduction”, in They Play, You Pay: Why Taxpayers Build Ballparks, Stadiums, and Arenas for Billionaire Owners...

Synonyms of butterfingered

Forms of butterfingered

comparativemore butterfingered
superlativemost butterfingered
alternative formbutter-fingered

Origin of butterfingered

From butter + fingered (“having fingers (of the specified kind)”), an allusion to people tending to drop things because their hands are so slippery that they seem to be covered in butter.

Words formed from butterfingered

Questions about butterfingered

What does butterfingered mean?
Butterfingered means prone to dropping things; clumsy.
How do you use butterfingered in a sentence?
But their passing game was anemic and they had butterfingered receivers, who dropped passes and fumbled the ball with alarming regularity.
What part of speech is butterfingered?
Butterfingered is an adjective.
How do you pronounce butterfingered?
Butterfingered is pronounced /ˈbʌtəˌfɪŋɡəd/ (UK).

Words near butterfingered in the dictionary

  1. butterfatty
  2. Butterfield
  3. Butterfields
  4. butterfin
  5. butterfinger
  6. butterfingered
  7. butterfingers
  8. butterfish
  9. butterfishes
  10. butterflied
  11. butterflier

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: butterfingered (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-butterfingered.wav.

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