dextrous
Americanadjective
adjective
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Explanation
If you're dextrous, you're graceful and skilled. A dextrous magician can wave her hands around and appear to pull a rabbit out of thin air. When you're dextrous, you have a physical skill — you could be a dextrous football player or a dextrous bass guitarist. You can also describe someone as dextrous who's a quick or clever thinker: "Her jokes are hilarious because she's really verbally dextrous." You can also spell this word as dexterous, and both versions have a Latin root, dexter, "skillful."
Vocabulary lists containing dextrous
A Man Called Ove
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Paradise Lost
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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.
As many great apes perform dextrous and technical foraging behaviours, it is likely that the capacity for these complex sequences is shared across ape species.
From Science Daily • Dec. 5, 2024
The elusive, Brooklyn-based rapper Leikeili47 keeps her identity hidden under a ski mask, ensuring the focus remains on her dextrous, quotable lyrics.
From BBC • Oct. 8, 2023
Next came Bing, Microsoft's search engine updated with a similarly dextrous chatbot, which can answer queries where no obvious result existed online -- like what car seat to buy for a particular model vehicle.
From Reuters • May 10, 2023
With little more than a wardrobe full of costumes and a homemade green screen, he transformed his dextrous wit and encyclopedic knowledge of musical theater into a profoundly successful career.
From Salon • Apr. 30, 2022
In Salvator, the imagination is vigorous, the composition dextrous and � 19.
From Modern Painters Volume II (of V) by Ruskin, John
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.
