What does "butterfingers" mean?

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

What is a synonym for "butterfingers"?

Common synonyms include: butterfinger, clumsy, dauber, dub, duffer, foozler.

Pronounced //ˈbʌtəˌfɪŋɡəz//.

//ˈbʌtəˌfɪŋɡəz// noun, slang

noun, slang ·Moderate ·College level

Noun

1
Someone who tends to drop things; (more generally) someone who is clumsy or uncoordinated; a klutz. idiomatic, informal
"I am such a butterfingers. That’s the third drink I’ve spilled today."
2
someone who drops things (especially one who cannot catch a ball) wordnet
3
One's fingers which tend to drop things, or are clumsy or uncoordinated. idiomatic, informal
"“I guess everyone’s got butterfingers around here,” Cole said with a sly smile. “Lucky for us, I’ve got fast reflexes.”"
4
A tendency to drop things, or to be clumsy or uncoordinated. idiomatic, informal

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

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

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.