Tweezers are a small hand tool made of two thin pieces of metal joined at one end, designed to grip and pick up tiny objects. When you squeeze the joined end, the pointed tips at the other end come together, letting you grasp things too small for your fingers to handle easily.

You might use tweezers to remove a splinter from your finger, pick up a small electronic component when building a circuit, or carefully position a tiny sticker. Jewelers use tweezers to handle precious stones, scientists use them to manipulate specimens under microscopes, and stamp collectors use them to avoid damaging delicate stamps with fingerprints.

The design is simple but clever: by squeezing at one end, you create precise pressure at the other end, giving you control over objects as small as a grain of rice or even tinier. Some tweezers have pointed tips for precision work, while others have flat or angled tips for different tasks.

The word tweezers is almost always plural, like scissors or pants, even though you're holding just one tool. You'd say “these tweezers are sharp” rather than “this tweezer is sharp,” though people sometimes informally say “a pair of tweezers.”