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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

duffer.

An incompetent, indolent, or clumsy person.

6 characters2 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/ˈdʌfɚ/General-American/ˈdʌfə/Received-Pronunciation
  1. An incompetent, indolent, or clumsy person.

    informal
  2. A player having little skill, especially a golfer who duffs.

  3. A pedlar or hawker, especially one selling cheap or substandard goods.

    archaic
  4. Cheap or substandard goods sold by a duffer.

    archaic
  5. Anything substandard, such as a counterfeit or a defective instance.

    archaic
  6. A cow that does not produce milk or produces substantially less than her peers do.

    dated
  7. A cattle thief or thief of other livestock; one who alters the brands of cattle.

    Australia · dated
  8. A racing pigeon that does not perform well.

  9. Any of various nymphalid butterflies of the genus Discophora.

Where this word comes from

Cognate with duff, which see (origin is uncertain).

adj/ˈdʌfɚ/General-American/ˈdʌfə/Received-Pronunciation
  1. comparative form of duff: more duff

    comparative · form-of
Where this word comes from

Cognate with duff, which see (origin is uncertain).

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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.