tinker
Americannoun
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tinkers
plural
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a mender of pots, kettles, pans, etc., usually an itinerant.
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an unskillful or clumsy worker; bungler.
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a person skilled in various minor kinds of mechanical work; jack-of-all-trades.
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an act or instance of tinkering.
Let me have a tinker at that motor.
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Scot., Irish English.
verb (used without object)
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tinkers,
present (3rd person singular)
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tinkered,
past participle, past
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tinkering
present participle
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to busy oneself with a thing without useful results.
Stop tinkering with that clock and take it to the repair shop.
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to work unskillfully or clumsily at anything.
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to do the work of a tinker.
verb (used with object)
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tinkers,
present (3rd person singular)
-
tinkered,
past participle, past
-
tinkering
present participle
-
to mend as a tinker.
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to repair in an unskillful, clumsy, or makeshift way.
noun
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(esp formerly) a travelling mender of pots and pans
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a clumsy worker
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the act of tinkering
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another name for Gypsy
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informal a mischievous child
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any of several small mackerels that occur off the North American coast of the Atlantic
verb
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to play, fiddle, or meddle (with machinery, etc), esp while undertaking repairs
-
to mend (pots and pans) as a tinker
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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tinkersimple
-
tinkerssimple
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have tinkeredperfect
-
has tinkeredperfect
-
am tinkeringprogressive
-
are tinkeringprogressive
-
is tinkeringprogressive
-
have been tinkeringperfect progressive
-
has been tinkeringperfect progressive
Past
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tinkeredsimple
-
had tinkeredperfect
-
was tinkeringprogressive
-
were tinkeringprogressive
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had been tinkeringperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of tinker
First recorded in 1225–75; Middle English tinkere (noun), syncopated variant of tinekere “worker in tin”
Explanation
When you tinker, you work casually or attempt to fix something, the way you might tinker with your brother's old bike or tinker with the website you're building for fun. As a verb, tinker means to fix (or mess around with) just about anything. For example, your creative writing teacher might ask you to tinker with your most recent short story and add more specific, vivid details. As a noun, tinker refers to a person whose job involves traveling around and fixing things. It's an old-fashioned word, dating from the 13th century, when traveling tinsmith wasn't an uncommon occupation.
Vocabulary lists containing tinker
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
In the past, Newsom has been reluctant to greenlight laws that tinker with the state budget after those fiscal discussions conclude in the first half of the calendar year.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 29, 2026
I devised a game: Every day I set foot in the garage, I needed to get rid of one thing on the shelves before I could enter the workshop to tinker.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 8, 2026
For a long time, I’d watched Paul tinker with the recipe for his perfect relationship.
From Salon ● Jul. 5, 2026
She also got to treat patients, including one with "fidgety legs", give out pretend prescriptions, take phone calls and tinker with various bits of medical equipment.
From BBC ● Jun. 28, 2026
“Have you heard the one about the tinker, the Tehlin, the farmer’s daughter, and the butter churn yet?”
From "The Name of the Wind" by Patrick Rothfuss
An engineer tinkers and steadies it so the pilot will have a stable view.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 30, 2026
As fans and pundits begin to predict City's downfall, Guardiola tinkers with his squad before a long winning streak results in his club being crowned Premier League champions.
From BBC ● Apr. 25, 2026
There was this feeling, especially early on, where it felt like we were the tinkers in “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 21, 2024
Tesla frequently tinkers with the trim level names, driving ranges, power and features for its vehicles.
From Seattle Times ● May 15, 2024
Nor did Oppenheimer share the hauteur that other theoretical physicists displayed toward Lawrence and his crew of preoccupied tinkers.
From "Big Science" by Michael Hiltzik
As he tinkered, he told David Allemann and Caspar Coppetti about his experiments, and they were hiking in the Swiss Alps when they decided to take on a more grueling uphill challenge: starting a company.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 3, 2026
As the production fell further and further behind schedule, Mr. Pallenberg frantically rewrote the ending, blithely confessing that he tinkered around with killing off this or that character as the mood struck.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 27, 2026
Along the way, he tinkered with classical music on 1991's Liverpool Oratorio and released a series of dance albums as The Fireman.
From BBC ● May 27, 2026
"Yesterday, two helicopters landed right here. They tinkered with something, then left again," Mathiassen recalled.
From Barron's ● Mar. 3, 2026
He tinkered for a few minutes on his metalworking project—which he still wouldn't show me—but soon enough he was yawning.
From "The Sea of Monsters" by Rick Riordan
During more than a decade of Britain’s tinkering and planning, China built the world’s highest bridge and Canada forged a river crossing to the U.S.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 15, 2026
With coaches still tinkering with lineups in the preseason, turnovers became a problem when the ballhandling options dwindled.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 10, 2026
For people tinkering around the edges, with the goal of feeling stronger and more energetic, the glut of recommendations in here could feel empowering, perhaps like a sturdy reference text.
From Slate ● Sep. 18, 2026
Shtilierman, an engineer and physicist more comfortable tinkering with prototypes than managing personnel and production chains, had known Terekh for several years and valued her business acumen.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 15, 2026
Inventors often have to persist at their tinkering for a long time in the absence of public demand, because early models perform too poorly to be useful.
From "Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies" by Jared M. Diamond
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