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PlainSpell

butterfingers

but·ter·fing·ers/ˈbʌtɚˌfɪŋɡɚz/noun

butterfingers is a noun meaning “Someone who tends to drop things; (more generally) someone who is clumsy or uncoordinated; a klutz” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled B-U-T-T-E-R-F-I-N-G-E-R-S and has 4 syllables (but·ter·fing·ers), and it appears about once in every 10 million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data).

What does butterfingers mean?

noun

  1. 1

    informalSomeone who tends to drop things; (more generally) someone who is clumsy or uncoordinated; a klutz.

    I am such a butterfingers. That’s the third drink I’ve spilled today.

  2. 2

    informalOne's fingers which tend to drop things, or are clumsy or uncoordinated.

  3. 3

    informalA tendency to drop things, or to be clumsy or uncoordinated.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

How do you pronounce butterfingers?

  • UK /ˈbʌtəˌfɪŋɡəz/
  • US /ˈbʌtɚˌfɪŋɡɚz/
  • US [-ɾɚ-]

Butterfingers has 4 syllables, split but·ter·fing·ers in writing.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: LL-Q1860_(eng)-Vealhurl-butterfingers.wav, En-au-butter_fingers.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

Forms of butterfingers

  • butter fingers

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

How common is butterfingers?

Butterfingers appears about once in every 10 million words in written English, the 97,057th most frequent word form in the list.

Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).

Butterfingers in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

LanguageWords
Frenchmaladroit (e) (someone who tends to drop things), avoir deux mains gauches, maladroit (someone who is clumsy or uncoordinated)
GermanTollpatsch, Tölpel (someone who tends to drop things), Mensch mit zwei linken Händen, unbeholfener Mensch, ungeschickte Person (someone who is clumsy or uncoordinated)
Portuguesemão furada, mãos de manteiga (someone who tends to drop things)
Spanishmanazas, manos muertas, torpe (someone who tends to drop things), manos de manteca (someone who is clumsy or uncoordinated)

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.

Where does butterfingers come from?

From butter + fingers (suggesting that someone is clumsy and drops things as if their hands are coated in slippery butter), from butterfingered.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).