The hand is the part of your body at the end of your arm, made up of your palm, fingers, and thumb. Your hands let you grip, write, throw, build, play instruments, type, and do countless other tasks that require precision and control. Humans have remarkably versatile hands compared to other animals: our opposable thumbs can touch each fingertip, allowing us to hold tools, button shirts, and perform delicate work like threading a needle.

The word also appears in many expressions. When you give someone a hand, you're helping them (or sometimes applauding them). When something gets out of hand, it becomes difficult to control. If you try your hand at something, you're attempting it for the first time. A hand-me-down is clothing or an item passed from an older sibling to a younger one.

In card games, your hand refers to the cards you're holding. A ranch worker or sailor might be called a ranch hand or deckhand. And when you write something by hand, you're writing it yourself rather than typing or printing it.

The hand has been crucial to human development: our ability to manipulate objects with precision helped our ancestors create tools, which helped human civilization advance. Today, whether you're shooting a basketball, solving a Rubik's cube, or learning to play piano, your hands remain among your most useful and remarkable tools.