70 Interesting Character Flaws to Use In Your Story
The almost-good 🤷🏻♀️
Most of these character flaws are more annoying than harmful; some are even a little endearing. Others do have the potential to harm, but rarely evolve to that extent. If you’re looking for a minor flaw to round out your likable protagonist, this section is for you!
1. Awkward – socially uneasy and uncomfortable.
Example: Cath Avery in Fangirl.
2. Boring – dull, tedious, uninteresting (not to be confused with a flat character, who’s not even developed enough to be boring).
Example: Mary Bennet in Pride and Prejudice.
3. Capricious – given to flights of fancy and impulsive behaviors.
Example: Lily Bart in The House of Mirth.
4. Childish – silly, immature, or innocent.
Example: Peter in Peter Pan.
5. Clumsy – uncoordinated and fumbling; often accident-prone.
Example: Bella Swan in Twilight.
6. Foolish – lacking good judgment or common sense.
Example: Bertie Wooster in Jeeves and Wooster.
7. Gossipy – inclined to spread rumors or talk about others behind their backs.
Example: Mrs. Jennings in Sense and Sensibility.
8. Gullible – easily fooled or persuaded to believe something.
Example: Valentine Michael Smith in Stranger in a Strange Land.
9. Humorless – having no sense of humor; solemn.
Example: Percy Weasley in Harry Potter.
10. Lazy – unwilling to work; slothful.
Example: Gervaise Macquart in L'Assommoir.
11. Meek – overly gentle and submissive.
Example: Charlie Kelmeckis in The Perks of Being a Wallflower.
12. Mischievous – playfully troublesome; rascally or roguish.
Example: Tom Sawyer in The Adventures of Tom Sawyer.
14. Obnoxious – highly irritating and unpleasant.
Example: Eustace Scrubb in Voyage of the Dawn Treader.
15. Prideful – having a lofty opinion of oneself and rarely admitting to being wrong.
Example: Mr. Darcy in Pride and Prejudice.
16. Shallow – having few profound thoughts and caring only for insignificant things.
Example: Daisy Buchanan in The Great Gatsby.
17. Skeptical – doubtful or disbelieving.
Example: Lucy’s siblings (at first) in The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe.
18. Spacey – having one’s head in the clouds; absent-minded.
Example: Luna Lovegood in Harry Potter.
19. Spoiled – bratty and self-centered as a result of overindulgence.
Example: Mary Lennox (at first) in The Secret Garden.
20. Stubborn – willful and headstrong; refusing to give up.
Example: Anne Shirley in Anne of Green Gables.
21. Tactless – not very nuanced or sensitive in dealings with others.
Example: Hermes in Circe.
22. Vain – preoccupied with one’s physical appearance.
Example: Amy March in Little Women.
The bad 😬
These character flaws should be taken more seriously: they can impact a character’s life quite heavily, as well as the lives of those around them. From adultery to greed to pure stupidity, if you choose one of these flaws for your character, make sure you’ve carefully considered how it will shape their story — and indeed, whether that journey will end with them overcoming their limitations or atoning for their sins.
23. Adulterous – cheating on one’s partner or spouse.
Example: John Proctor in The Crucible.
24. Anxious – experiencing frequent nerves or apprehension.
Example: Craig Gilner in It’s Kind of a Funny Story.
25. Apathetic – having little interest in or enthusiasm for life.
Example: The narrator in Fight Club.
26. Arrogant – haughty, conceited, exaggeratedly self-important.
Example: Draco Malfoy in Harry Potter.
27. Belligerent – hostile and aggressive, even when unprovoked.
Example: Curley in Of Mice and Men.
28. Bitter – resentful and unpleasant because of a past experience.
Example: Miss Havisham in Great Expectations.
29. Cowardly – lacking the courage to stand up for what’s right.
Example: Arthur Dimmesdale in The Scarlet Letter.
30. Dishonest – lying or behaving in a deceitful manner, usually to take advantage of others.
Example: George Wickham in Pride and Prejudice.
31. Envious – wanting to possess what another has (may be a physical object or a character trait).
Example: Gene Forrester in A Separate Peace.
32. Greedy – always desiring more (food, wealth, attention, etc.), even to their own detriment.
Example: Augustus Gloop in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.
33. Hedonistic – indulging completely in the pursuit of pleasure.
Example: Dorian Gray in The Picture of Dorian Gray.
34. Hubristic – excessively self-confident in one’s ideas or abilities.
Example: Icarus in the Metamorphoses.
35. Hypocritical – acting in opposition to one’s beliefs or proclamations about others, typically because one believes they are “above” them.
Example: Mr. Brocklehurst in Jane Eyre.
36. Ignorant – possessing little practical knowledge or awareness of the world.
Example: Effie Trinket in The Hunger Games.
37. Incompetent – unable to perform basic tasks.
Example: Mr. Poe in A Series of Unfortunate Events.
38. Inconsiderate – caring little for the feelings of others.
Example: Sherlock Holmes in Sherlock Holmes.
39. Judgmental – critical and disapproving, often in an outspoken way.
Example: Holden Caulfield in The Catcher in the Rye.
40. Lustful – overwhelmed with sexual desire.
Example: Humbert Humbert in Lolita.
41. Morally gray – neither good nor evil in a conventional sense; characterized by moral ambiguity.
Example: Kaz Brekker in Six of Crows.
42. Obsequious – so deferential and flattering as to be unsettling.
Example: Uriah Heep in David Copperfield.
43. Possessive – overprotective and controlling.
Example: Edward Cullen in Twilight.
44. Quixotic – overly idealistic and hindered by their own expectations.
Example: Emma Bovary in Madame Bovary.
45. Rigid – utterly inflexible in one’s principles, even when presented with reason to change.
Example: Javert in Les Misérables.
46. Selfish – being solely concerned with one’s own needs and desires.
Example: Scarlett O’Hara (at first) in Gone With the Wind.
47. Short-tempered – quick to anger.
Example: Jack Torrance in The Shining.
48. Spiteful – bitter and malicious.
Example: Severus Snape in Harry Potter.
49. Stingy – mean and ungenerous.
Example: Ebenezer Scrooge in A Christmas Carol.
50. Stupid – showing little intelligence in one’s decisions or actions.
Example: Joffrey Baratheon in A Song of Ice and Fire.
51. Vengeful – seeking ramifications for others as a form of revenge.
Example: Edmond Dantès in The Count of Monte Cristo (though to be fair, he’s pretty justified).
52. Weak-willed – timid and spineless.
Example: Peter Pettigrew in Harry Potter.
The ugly ☠️
Now for the character flaws you’ll most often see in outright villains: cruelty, treachery, a total lack of remorse, and so on. While it’s certainly fascinating to think about how such deep-seated flaws can be effectively balanced with other traits, take caution! Some readers may be unable to forgive protagonists who demonstrate these flaws, even over the course of multi-book character arcs to show they’ve changed.
That said, if you’re looking for a challenge (or aiming to create that once-in-a-blue moon egregious antihero who’s just sympathetic enough to work), have at it. But don’t say we didn’t warn you — and consider getting a sensitivity reader if you’re working with a flaw that involves a delicate issue, like bigotry or abuse.
53. Abusive – engaging in habitual and extreme cruelty or violence.
Example: Alphonso in The Color Purple.
54. Bigoted – harboring fierce, immovable prejudices about a certain group.
Example: Dolores Umbridge in Harry Potter.
55. Cruel – willfully causing pain and suffering to others.
Example: Heathcliff in Wuthering Heights.
56. Disloyal – failing to remain true to the person/entity to whom one has pledged their allegiance.
Example: Brutus in Julius Caesar.
57. Fanatical – extremely zealous to the point of delusion.
Example: Annie Wilkes in Misery.
58. Intolerant – narrow-minded and unaccepting of others, sometimes to the point of violence.
Example: Bob Ewell in To Kill a Mockingbird.
59. Machiavellian – cunning, manipulative, and unscrupulous in one’s schemes.
Example: Tom Ripley in The Talented Mr. Ripley.
60. Manipulative – conniving and controlling others to get what one wants.
Example: Amy Dunne in Gone Girl.
61. Murderous – desiring to kill; homicidal.
Example: Hannibal Lecter in Silence of the Lambs.
62. Neglectful – failing to give proper care or attention to someone or something.
Example: Paul Dombey in Dombey and Son.
63. Obsessive – so consumed by a single subject that one cannot function normally.
Example: Captain Ahab in Moby-Dick.
64. Oppressive – brutally authoritarian toward a group of people considered “lesser.”
Example: The Commanders of Gilead in The Handmaid’s Tale.
65. Paranoid – unusually suspicious, mistrustful, or nervous that something bad will happen to them.
Example: Raskolnikov in Crime and Punishment.
66. Remorseless – feeling no shame, regret, or sympathy when they’ve done something wrong.
Example: Anthony James Marston in And Then There Were None.
67. Sadistic – taking pleasure in inflicting pain or humiliation upon others.
Example: Nurse Ratched in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.
68. Self-destructive – acting in such a way as to destroy one’s own health and/or happiness.
Example: Anna in Anna Karenina.
69. Treacherous – deeply disloyal and traitorous, usually for personal gain.
Example: Iago in Othello.
70. Violent – viciously, physically harmful to others.
Example: Patrick Bateman in American Psycho.
Just going to put this out there: it doesn’t account for every trait a character can have, but a really interesting and arguably more realistic way to look at characters (your own or otherwise) is not really that they have ‘good’, ‘bad’ and ‘neutral’ traits, but that they have a set of deeply-embedded and very durable core traits, values, beliefs, fears, desires, etc. that manifest differently according to the context. Most traits are neutral. A redemption or corruption arc would be changes to the context - which could be external, like a new person, or internal, like the character’s underlying perspective of someone or something shifting - giving the character’s fundamental traits a chance to manifest and develop in a better or worse way. You want to protect your loved ones and would do anything for them? Great! What a noble, sympathetic motivation! You think you need to kill children to protect your loved ones? …Not so great. But you still have internal consistency! Understanding a character’s core allows them to stay consistent in spite of their external and internal journeys.
To me, a strength is not quite the same thing as a virtue; a weakness is not quite the same as a vice. Virtues and vices are good and bad, respectively, in and of themselves. They will be broadly considered positive and negative in almost any situation, at least by the audience. Habitually treat innocent people like dirt, for whatever reason? Vice. Excessive cruelty is one of the most basic human no-nos. Care about people getting what they deserve? Virtue. In our minds a serial killer who kills ten random people is much worse than a serial killer who kills ten murderers and rapists with the exact same methods and sadism. Virtues and vices are moral. Strength and weaknesses are practical, and thus much more fluid. I define a strength as any trait or skill that is useful to the character, their allies and/or moving the plot in their favour. These can change from one to the other in a scene; in the presence of different company; with the character’s varying mental health. Good liar? Strength, when you’re an undercover spy. Brave? Weakness, when you need to be cautious and hold back. Selfishness can be a hero’s driving strength. Being self-sacrificing can be nothing but harmful. Unconditional loyalty can make a character the best, most helpful friend ever… to the evil psychopath. Ambition for the sake of it can motivate the classic villain to take over the world, or the hero to prove themselves and save the world.
Through this lens there’s no reason to give your villains solely immoral and unlikeable traits (aka vices) or vice versa. Because at least a substantial portion of their personality is an entirely different beast from their moral alignment. I love characters who, while still being plausibly and recognizably themselves, could have turned out on the opposite side of the moral conflict had a circumstance or two been altered. Like, in most of the infinite parallel universes of this story, they’re ‘good’ or ‘evil’ when really they’re just always them.
I'm sure someone's said this before but have y'all Gladnis shippers noticed that when you train with Iggy and evaluate his weaknesses, his only "weapons" weakness is a shield
so just to build on this a lil, I see Jillian as very much influenced by her father Jacob. She’s quite a lot like him and he’s taught her to work hard for what she wants. I can for sure picture him taking her out to the forest and teaching her survival skills and shit.
She can be pretty bossy at times and likes to have total control over the situations she’s in. Since Staci is pretty lax, he’s trying to teach her to loosen up a lil, which she is getting better at.
She definitely has Staci’s dry, sarcastic sense of humor tho, which can sometimes be a bit jarring coming from a child lmao
im trying to flesh out a character but he seems too perfect; hes nice, studious etc.. i want to give him flaws, but no matter how hard i try i cant find anything that suits him
Flaw for a too perfect character
I know you’re trying to find something that fits, but sometimes finding a flaw that seems to fit ends up making the character predictable, and maybe even boring, despite them having a flaw. Instead of finding a character flaw that seems to fit with his personality, try the opposite. Try to think of the unpredictable traits and see how those work.
A predictable character flaw for someone studious might be impatience, constantly annoyed when someone attempts to interrupt him or ask him too many questions about what he’s working on. But what if he was studious because he himself struggles to understand things? What if he spends hours and hours with books and research because one hour just isn’t enough to grasp the concept? And his persistence to understand concepts could lead back to insecurities he’s had in the past - what makes him believe he has to understand something fully to be a better person? Why does he have to know it all?
Another technique you could try is coming up with a list of just basic character flaws, with no consideration in mind for your specific character. Give yourself a catalog of ideas to start with. Then start plugging in and seeing how it rounds him out.
Try one of these websites if you’re stuck with this.
Character Flaw Generator
Character Flaw Reference Sheet
Ultimately though, don’t be afraid of flaws that don’t seem to fit. Blending traits that don’t seem to go together is what makes your character unique! And the more unique they are, the more fun they are to write about and read about.
Happy Monday everybody!
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It’s probably fair to say that we do most of our planning, and character development centered around our main characters. It makes sense. When we’re writing a story, the character drawing the most attention and scrutiny is the main character. Most stories also have a few side characters. While the side characters don’t hold the same importance in a story as the main character, they are still an…
