daintily
Americanadverb
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in a way that shows fine or delicate manners or tastes.
She'd been nibbling daintily on a sparerib; now she dabbed her lips with a napkin.
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with particular care to avoid soiling, spilling, damage, etc.; fastidiously.
We piled our trash daintily atop overfilled garbage cans.
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delicately and beautifully, or with fine, exquisite detail.
I was glad for the moment to be neither an ornithologist nor an entomologist, so that I might leave every one of these daintily colored sunbirds and butterflies to the enjoyment of its life.
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of daintily
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.
McDonald’s has been the object of social-media derision since a Feb. 3 video of its CEO nibbling daintily at the chain’s latest offering, the multilayer Big Arch.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 22, 2026
Not every collection is a success: a delicate red-orange shrimp daintily eludes the suction tube, swirling its long antenna as it swims almost triumphantly beyond reach.
From Barron's ● Jan. 26, 2026
At one point, she daintily wraps a piece of tulle ribbon around a raw fish carcass.
From Salon ● May 16, 2023
The actors distinguish themselves through affectations: a raised eyebrow, a bow, a giggle, a swept leg, a daintily dropped handkerchief, a cleared throat.
From New York Times ● Feb. 21, 2022
Fern did Vonetta one better, daintily holding out her skirt hem as if she wore a hoopskirt, and said, “I’m Fern, but my mother calls me Afua.”
From "P.S. Be Eleven" by Rita Williams-Garcia
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
