Image copyright AP

A magazine website that mistakenly replaced Donald Trump's name with the text "Someone With Tiny Hands" has explained how the error occurred.

Wired magazine posted a correction on Wednesday that was widely shared online.

"The name Donald Trump was erroneously replaced with the phrase 'Someone With Tiny Hands' when this story originally published," the statement said.

The publication blamed a joke browser extension for the substitution.

Image copyright Wired

Explaining the mistake, journalist Jason Tanz said a colleague who had installed an anti-Trump browser extension had contributed to his article which resulted in the switch.

Extensions are downloadable add-ons for web browsers that can perform a variety of functions, often adding features or improving productivity.

But joke extensions can also be added which perform specific functions, such as replacing every photo on a website with one of kittens.

"A member of our art team worked on a story of mine while an anti-Trump extension was installed on their browser," said Mr Tanz.

Image copyright Wired

"The result, unbeknownst to us, was that every instance of Trump's name got replaced with the sobriquet 'someone with tiny hands'."

The suggestion that Mr Trump has small hands is often used as an insult by his opponents, including Florida senator Marco Rubio.

Mr Trump has publicly defended the size of his hands, asking a debate audience: "Do these look like small hands?"

Image copyright Reuters

Mr Tanz said the browser add-on switched the text, and the submitted story was published because the magazine's editors thought it was an in-joke.

"Our production team thought the phrase was a meta-gag, and let it through," he said.