How to Use fiddly in a Sentence

fiddly

adjective

• This makes the work far less fiddly, less messy and as such is ideal for beginners.
  — New Atlas, 16 July 2024
• The walls are walnut, with lovely and fiddly details in the molding.
  — Katie McDonough, Curbed, 16 Feb. 2026
• Put another way, some of us might get to live our lives with one less fiddly thing to worry about — and that’s not nothing.
  — Chris Velazco, Washington Post, 10 June 2022
• Two of the steps require the clumsy manipulation of those fiddly wing nuts and hinges.
  — Thomas Ricker, The Verge, 2 July 2019
• The shoulder fur sections are fiddly parts of the build, as too much pressure can skew the semicircular frames.
  — Matt Gardner, Forbes.com, 26 Jan. 2026
• The fiddly build and lack of play features make this a Lego set that's better suited for collectors rather than younglings.
  — Rich Owen, Space.com, 29 Nov. 2025
• Analysts gripe that Renault’s alliance is too fiddly to value.
  — The Economist, 22 Mar. 2018
• But perhaps the best known, if rather fiddly, way of watching an eclipse using pinhole projection is to make your own pinhole camera.
  — Jamie Carter, Forbes, 29 Feb. 2024
• These machines still struggle with tasks like folding clothes or loading a dishwasher because of their fiddly nature.
  — Rachel Cormack, Robb Report, 22 Apr. 2026
• The carmaker has learned to be more nimble; Cruise has picked up how to make its fiddly technology robust enough for the open road.
  — The Economist, 25 Jan. 2018
• Just like the piano keys, these small accessories are composed of lots of fiddly bits that are easily squashed or separated.
  — Andrew Webster, The Verge, 3 May 2018
• If the plan is to film trail runs, moto rides, beach days, or ski laps without battery anxiety or fiddly menus, this price gets you straight to recording and sharing.
  — PC Magazine, 14 Oct. 2025
• Instead, the start of the 2026-27 pre-season tour was a look at the fiddly bits that need to be reduced in the weeks and months ahead.
  — Carl Anka, New York Times, 19 July 2026
• Apple has rightly resisted the temptation of building in fiddly touch controls.
  — Bloomberg News, The Denver Post, 20 Oct. 2019
• While power meters are handy for tracking cycling performance, mounting and calibrating the things can be a fiddly process.
  — New Atlas, 27 Dec. 2025
• The public will never accept having to navigate a digital world by way of fiddly controls like a touchpad on the glasses themselves.
  — Tim Bajarin, Time, 12 Sep. 2017
• The game comes with lots of fiddly stats to keep track of, requiring players to shove plastic cubes around its board constantly as part of some not-very-interesting bookkeeping.
  — Owen Duffy, Ars Technica, 20 Jan. 2018
• This dependable propane model heats up quickly, has reversible cast-iron grill grates (flip to the smaller side for small fiddly food like vegetables and shrimp), and is easy to assemble.
  — Lauren Joseph, Bon Appétit, 22 June 2021
• Preparing and maintaining qubits is a delicate and fiddly process, akin to classical computing in the days before silicon.
  — The Economist, 22 Feb. 2018
• The only real complaints here are the fiddly controls for grabbing other players and the slow, between-round waits that hamper the frenetic nature of the mini-games themselves.
  — Ars Staff, Ars Technica, 22 Dec. 2020
• The design isn’t all that discreet, and the clever engineering is undermined by hardware limitations, such as the lack of weatherproofing and the fiddly arms that secure it to your neck.
  — Andrew Gebhart, PC Magazine, 30 June 2026
• Even the technology is reassuringly old-fashioned, with no confusing switches or fiddly shower settings.
  — Condé Nast, Condé Nast Traveler, 9 Feb. 2026
• Getting rid of those removable Joy-Cons—and the fiddly snap-on connection tying them to the main system housing—just makes the Switch Lite feel more solid in the hands.
  — Kyle Orland, Ars Technica, 19 Sep. 2019
• The fiddly little parts that the company churns out—many billions every year—are today mostly made from acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene, or ABS.
  — WIRED, 30 Sep. 2023
• Without synthetics to rely on for stretch and grip, Cottonique uses drawstrings, which could be considered fiddly and bulky, or too much of a trade-off, particularly for undergarments.
  — Sophie Benson, Vogue, 30 Oct. 2025
• BikeOn View gallery - 3 images While power meters are very handy tools for tracking your cycling performance, mounting and calibrating the things can be a fiddly process.
  — New Atlas, 20 Aug. 2025
• But linking the computers running such software to radios is often surprisingly fiddly in the age of painless USB and Bluetooth.
  — IEEE Spectrum, 19 Feb. 2016
• View gallery - 4 images Soldering frequently involves hunching in and squinting at the fiddly task at hand, or performing that task under an unmoving magnifying glass.
  — New Atlas, 30 Jan. 2026
• The stubby stylus is far too short to use comfortably, while the micro SD card slot (a 4GB card is included) and the cartridge slot have been moved behind a fiddly plastic flap.
  — Mark Walton, Ars Technica, 27 June 2017
• Instead of issuing a blanket ban on all products from a high-risk region or entity, authorities must investigate individual products, which is fiddly and tedious.
  — Jasmin Malik Chua, Sourcing Journal, 25 Nov. 2025