Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Skillful in using one's hands; manually adroit. See Synonyms at dexterous.
- adj. Readily accessible: found a handy spot for the hammer.
- adj. Useful; convenient: a handy tool.
- adj. Easy to use or handle: a handy reference book.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- Performed by the hand; manual.
- Skilful in using the hands; performing with skill or readiness; dexterous; adroit.
- Marked by readiness or dexterity; deft; facile.
- Suited to the use of the hand; ready to the hand; convenient; timely: as, my books are very handy; this is a handy tool.
- [Handy in composition, in some words formed in imitation of handywork, handiwork, is a variant of hand. See following entries.] Synonyms Expert, clever.
Wiktionary
GNU Webster's 1913
- adj. obsolete Performed by the hand.
- adj. Skillful in using the hand; dexterous; ready; adroit.
- adj. Ready to the hand; near; also, suited to the use of the hand; convenient; valuable for reference or use
- adj. (Naut.) Easily managed; obedient to the helm; -- said of a vessel.
WordNet 3.0
- adj. skillful with the hands
- n. United States blues musician who transcribed and published traditional blues music (1873-1958)
- adj. easy to use
- adj. easy to reach
Etymologies
- From Middle English, alteration of earlier hendi ("handy, skillful"), from Old English hendiġ ("skillful") (as in listhendiġ ("skilled in art")), from Proto-Germanic *handugaz (“handy, skillful, nimble”), from *handuz (“hand”), equivalent to hand + -y. Cognate with Middle Low German handich ("skillful, apt"), Middle High German handec, hendec ("manual, hand-held"), Old Norse hǫndugr ("efficient"), Gothic 𐌷𐌰𐌽𐌳𐌿𐌲𐍃 (handugs, "wise, clever"). (Wiktionary)
Examples
“The only time shutdown - a comes in handy is when there's a countdown timer on screen, started by Windows.”
How To Stop Windows From Shutting Down | Lifehacker Australia
“There is a very interesting book on this subject, sorry don't have the title handy, google is your friend.”
“Unfortunately I didn't have the title handy when I blogged about it.”
“The ubiquitous term handy which every German speaker automatically assumes to be a genuine English term.”
“Where it really comes in handy is file open/save dialogs or any Explorer window — you can simply use the middle-click function to show the menu, and once you’ve selected something, Folder Menu will automatically navigate to the correct folder from within the dialog.”
Folder Menu Is A Powerful Folder Switching Tool | Lifehacker Australia
“Another time this will come in handy is if you’re cooking at a friend’s home where they don’t stock the same spices that you do, and you’re trying to season a favorite dish.”
“A fun exercise for intro level physics students is to read a paper that came out in scientific American a few years ago I’m sorry but I don’t have the title handy on MOND.”
“We have a recording of this conversation, but I’ll keep your name handy so we’ll know who to blame if the facts in your article are wrong.”
“Their efforts have come in handy for several young children, who reported that they knew how to react when they encountered fire in their own homes.”
The Huffington Post: Rescued Dog 'Sparkles' Teaches Children About Fire Safety
“Mr. Boren, who works for Google, was chided for having a Google phone, but it came in handy because he could bring up a road map of the area and see which routes were marked in green (flowing traffic) to yellow and red (congestion).”
Road Trip: ‘For You, Obama!’ - The Caucus Blog - NYTimes.com
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘handy’.
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Handy Words
List of words and phrases referring to the hand, hands, fist, or derivatives of the Latin manus, beginning with left-handed.
left-handed, double-fisted, fisticuffs, handy, right-handed, two-handed, manual, manumission, manuscript, manually, manustupration, manudiction and 164 more...
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EN - pseudo-English words
English words used by foreigners in a different sense than they would be used by native speakers + madeupical "English" words that sound English but are not recognized as such by native speakers of...
abseiling, advertising, agroboy, airco, air-condition, relooker, apart, autogrill, autostop, babykiller, baby-foot, babylift and 263 more...
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Interesting words
A list of words that are odd or words that I have looked up.
concupiscence, brize, scree, scoria, forestaff, spanaemia, valetudinarianism, distasture, pyrethrum, laudanum, gentian, bicameral and 11184 more...
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Whatever's at hand
For a more comprehensive list, see Hernesheir's Handy Words.
For trivet's wonderful list of handy compounds, see handie.
hand, hands, handy, handedness, Tristram Shandy, left hand, red-handed, cackhanded, on the other hand, on the one hand, to hand, backhand and 18 more...
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Let's get back to our enraged sheep :...
Idiomatic wisdom from other countries and cultures. For some of the more obscure languages, expressions were found on the excellent site omniglot.com
donde ronca tigre..., a cada cerdo le l..., Поредити бабе и жабе, baba şi mitraliera, a otro perro con ..., llevar hierro al ..., no se le puede pe..., no se pescan truc..., ada udang di bali..., ropa inte hej för..., nu är det kokta f..., att lägga lök på ... and 210 more...
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The Sog Collection
My big word list.
chaos, flaccid, empirical, flotsam, cacophony, grumble, assuage, awe, romance, mortality, coalesce, fortuitous and 3282 more...
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Just 'cause I like 'em, H
hurlyburly, hurtle, hodgepodge, heartwood, hatch, halo, hooptedoodle, hacienda, hairpin, heyday, hardscrabble, hopper and 208 more...
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faux amis
Words which mean something different in another language.
gift, rat, handy, puff, mist, bald, bad, tripper, qualm, slip, fast, art and 57 more...
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Unglish
English words or roots that take on a new life elsewhere
footing, making off, entry from backsi..., mister, water, full optional, prepone, chalkdown, upful, history-sheeter, frothy, no noising and 17 more...
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Denglish words
Fake English words that have made it into the German language.
Tweets
Looking for tweets for handy.
sionnach German for cellphone. Jan 9, 2008