handheld

American  

[hand-held] / ˈhændˌhɛld /

Or hand-held

adjective

1. held in the hand or hands.

   a handheld torch.

2. small enough to be used or operated while being held in the hand or hands.

   a handheld hair drier.

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noun

1. something small enough to be used or operated while held in the hand or hands.

   She traded in her bulky old movie camera for a handheld.

Etymology

Origin of handheld

First recorded in 1920–25

Example Sentences

With the help of large handheld food mixers, they carefully grind the mixture of dried Californian grapes and water, which they then ferment before distilling it in a large still imported from Germany.

From Barron's • May 2, 2026

Orion has 32 cameras and devices - 15 mounted onto the spacecraft and 17 handheld by the crew.

From BBC • Apr. 5, 2026

Founded in 1998 under a different company name by Max Levchin, Peter Thiel and Luke Nosek, the startup initially focused on security software for handheld devices before shifting to digital payments.

From Los Angeles Times • Apr. 3, 2026

GPS—short for Global Positioning System—has long had dead spots, but its reliability has been further eroded by the emergence of cheap handheld devices that can drown out the satellite signals upon which it relies.

From The Wall Street Journal • Mar. 18, 2026

First were the handheld aerosols, beefed-up versions of the little canisters found in women’s purses.

From "Newjack: Guarding Sing Sing" by Ted Conover