unskillfulness

noun

as in incompetence

Related Words

Relevance

Dissimilar Words

Example Sentences

Recent Examples of Synonyms for unskillfulness
  1. incompetence
  2. incompetency
  3. inability
  4. clumsiness
Noun
  • The pressure to deliver will be a lot more on Man United players, as defender Lisandro Martínez hit out at the club’s top management for their incompetence following a loss to Atletico Madrid in the UEFA Champions League tie on Tuesday.
    — Jibin Joseph, PC Magazine, 18 Oct. 2026
  • Ah, the quaint days of 2004, when millions of people would crowd into theaters to watch a documentary about geopolitical incompetence.
    — Hershal Pandya, Vulture, 16 Oct. 2026
Definition of incompetence
Noun
  • Court records show DeFoor has a history of criminal cases involving findings of mental incompetency.
    — Bonny Chu, FOXNews.com, 2 Sep. 2026
  • Those forms are not pertinent to the finding of incompetency and are therefore subject to the open records law, Ziegler and Bradley wrote.
    — Scott Bauer, Los Angeles Times, 7 July 2026
Definition of incompetency
Noun
  • Analysts blame the falloff on Converse’s inability to innovate and its overreliance on the Chuck Taylor model, Fortune’s Phil Wahba reports.
    — Jim Edwards, Fortune, 20 Oct. 2026
  • This is what physicists call decoherence—the inability of many waves to show strong constructive interference.
    — Philipp Strasberg, Scientific American, 20 Oct. 2026
Definition of inability
Noun
  • Not for the first time, the president’s clumsiness is likely to negate his malevolence, though not without considerable cost, in time and money, to Comey.
    — Jonathan Chait, The Atlantic, 30 July 2026
  • Let a hypothermic victim get some sleep After the shivering, confusion, slurred speech, and clumsiness of hypothermia have manifested, an exposure victim also gets drowsy.
    — Tim MacWelch, Outdoor Life, 15 July 2026
Definition of clumsiness
Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

Browse Nearby Words

unskillfully
unskillfulness
unslakable
See all Nearby Words

Cite this Entry

“Unskillfulness.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/unskillfulness. Accessed 25 Oct. 2026.

Copy Citation
Love words? Need even more definitions?

Subscribe to America's largest dictionary and get thousands more definitions and advanced search—ad free!

Last Updated: - Updated example sentences

More from Merriam-Webster

Word of the Day

Listen to the pronunciation of emissary

See Definitions and Examples »

Popular in Grammar & Usage

See More

Merriam-Webster’s Great Big List of Words You Love to Hate

'Can' vs. 'May'

'Affect' vs. 'Effect'

More Commonly Mispronounced Words

Is it 'nerve-racking' or 'nerve-wracking'?
See More

Popular in Wordplay

See More

The Longest Long Words List

9 Words That Sound Like Insults But Aren't

The Words of the Week - Oct. 23

Even More Bird Names that Sound Like Insults (and Sometimes Are)

12 Lovely and Unusual Words for the Natural World
See More

Popular

See More

Merriam-Webster’s Great Big List of Words You Love to Hate

The Longest Long Words List

9 Words That Sound Like Insults But Aren't
See More

Games & Quizzes

See All
Play Quordle: Guess all four words in a limited number of tries. Each of your guesses must be a real 5-letter word.
Quordle Can you solve 4 words at once?
Play Blossom: Solve today's spelling word game by finding as many words as you can using just 7 letters. Longer words score more points.
Blossom Pick the best words!
Play Missing Letter: a crossword with a twist. Each of the 25 puzzle words start with a different letter of the alphabet. Which letter is missing?
The Missing Letter A daily crossword with a twist
different halloween monsters in silhouette
A Monstrous Vocab Quiz Words That Go Bump in the Night
See All