Two right hands
Ambidextrous means able to use both hands with equal skill. The word comes from Medieval Latin ambidexter: ambi, both, and dexter, right-handed. Literally, right-handed on both sides[1]. The noun is ambidexterity.
Look at your hands. One is the capable one — it signs, it cuts, it reaches for the mug on its own. The other waits. Someone ambidextrous has no hand that waits.
A double-dealer first
Here's the twist. When the word first arrived in English, in the late 14th century, it wasn't a compliment. An ambidexter was a double-dealer, someone who takes both sides in a conflict[1]. The sense of physical skill only settled in with ambidextrous, from the 1640s.
It makes sense, if you think about it. Anyone who can work with both hands can also play both sides of the table. The insult came first; the talent came later.
Strict or loose
So how many people are ambidextrous? It depends on how strict you are. Equal skill at every task, writing included: a tiny minority, under 1%. Just not being purely right-handed, on the other hand, gets you to 18.1% of people[2].
Two figures that far apart, and both are right. I line them up, study by study, in the ambidextrous statistics.
What it isn't
Ambidextrous doesn't mean mixed-handed. If you write with your right and throw with your left, you use different hands for different tasks. That's common, and it doesn't make you ambidextrous. An ambidextrous person does the same task equally well with either hand.
It doesn't mean left-handed either. A left-hander has a dominant hand — it's just the other one. Same as a right-hander, whose meaning I unpack in a sister article to this one.
The opposite of ambidextrous
It exists, and it's wonderful: ambisinistrous, clumsy with both hands. It's built from ambi and sinister, left, and has been on record since 1863[3]. There's even a synonym, ambilevous.
Two left hands, in other words. If you've ever dropped your phone from both hands in the same minute, now you know what to call yourself.
And the feet
The word was born for hands — dexter is the right hand. For feet, English usually says two-footed, or the rarer ambipedal, although some dictionaries now let "ambidextrous" stretch that far too. The whole story is in ambidextrous feet; the football side is in two-footed footballers.
Born or trained
Which brings us to the question that actually matters.
"What about me? Am I — or could I become one?"
For the first half there's the ambidextrous test: eight questions, a couple of minutes. For the second, read whether you can become ambidextrous, then pick your path in how to become ambidextrous.
The hand that waits
The hand that waits doesn't have to wait forever. Pick it up. Give it something to do.
Did you know the word started life as an insult? Tell me in the comments — and if this was useful, share it with the friend who brags about doing everything with both hands.
If you want a guided path, step by step, I've put all of it in a book.
