Other forms: cluttered, cluttering, clutters
Clutter is the messy pile of things covering every surface. Clear the clutter, too much clutter, cluttered up.
The word is about quantity without order: clutter is not dirt, and a clean room can be full of it. Decluttering is now a whole industry. Figuratively it covers anything unnecessary getting in the way — visual clutter on a page, clutter in a sentence. Note cluttered; and that the word comes from clot, so clutter is literally things clotting together in a heap.
1nounclutterA messy pile of things covering every surface.
“Her desk was buried under a clutter of papers, cups and old magazines.”
2verbfillTo fill untidily with things.
“Old newspapers and muddy shoes cluttered the hallway.”
clutter is untidy accumulation.
Middle English cloteren means to form clots or heap up, from clot. Clutter is literally things clotted into a pile.
Middle English
cloteren — to form clots; coagulate; heap on
English, today
clutter
Built from
From Middle English cloteren (“to form clots; coagulate; heap on”), from clot (“clot”), equivalent to clot + er. Compare Welsh cludair (“heap, pile”), cludeirio (“to heap”).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA