What would be the consequences? would be have less dexterity? gripping strength? or is it for protection?
What about toenails? is it the same deal?
These questions have started at least a couple of recent threads here (the first one by me). You might try a search on “fingernails” in the subject. My favorite post was, “Have you ever tried picking your nose with a cocktail wienie?”
I don’t think you’d really notice much difference. I’ve lost a couple of nails before (thumbnail following a very painful splinter incident as a kid, toenails due to bad climbing shoes, etc) so got a little first-hand experience.
My podiatrist told me that the toenail doesn’t really serve any particular purpose. The skin under it is sensitive because it’s shielded most of the time but there’s nothing special there, if your nail never grew back you’d get used to it (I got used to no nail for however long it took to grow back).
I managed to bang my nail-less toe a few times and there’s a little “ouch” but that was about it.
Unless you count my Mom using her nails to remove slivers when I was a wee little rugrat I don’t think that they aid manipulation at all, nor do they improve gripping strength.
Best use I can recall was a girlfriend who used to very lightly run her nails up and down my back which certainly worked wonders 
You’d probably have a hell of a time picking a coin up off the ground.
Primates may have originally evolved flat nails in place of claws because it makes it somewhat easier to release the grip from a branch when leaping about in the trees.
The reason they retained nails at all is probably for scratching in order to remove ectoparasites, and maybe to some extent to help open fruits or deal with other food items
Humans have fingernails and toenails mainly because of this primate legacy. Fingernails are still good for scratching, and for pinching things hard. If toenails have any use it’s mainly to offer some slight protection to the toe tips - though it’s not much, and you also run the risk of ripping off your toenail by stubbing it.
Scratching an itch would be very unsatisfactory without fingernails. Nor could we scratch lottery tickets, open a can of beer, or peel an orange. We’d have to resort to tools.
Oh, the humanity!
Fingernails would be nearly indispensible for ‘natural’ humans. They are far more then an evolutionary legacy. Try picking up a needle off a table without using nails. Yes you can do it, but it’s dams hard. Try eating an orange without nails. The only way to do it is to punch a hole through the skin with a finger. Using a nail you can neatly slice the skin and then peel it back. Try extracting a splinter without using nails.
Basically nails are essential for any fine work. You probably don’t even notice how often you use them even in the modern world.
Fingernails I can live without – I can open that orange with my teeth. But imagine if we didn’t have hooves, and had to walk around on bare skin. We’d always be cutting our feet up, and we’d have perpetual open sores down there. (Although I imagine we’d get by somehow.)
Wait, you have hooves?
All you have to do is ask a nail-biter…
When I’ve badly bitten my nails it is a significant inconvenience. You don’t realize just how much you need nails to manipulate small items. And it is near impossible to pick coins up. So you would certainly miss fingernails.
If only I could kick the disgusting habit. 
It would hurt a lot more to open a can of Coke, I tell you what. That’s what I can’t stand about breaking an important nail.
Sally Hansen would not be the rich lady about town that she is.
We’d have to come up with a new metaphor for describing something that grates on one’s nerves.
Short nails are an advantage for climbing and a lot of other rough work with your hands. No way are they getting torn off by accident.
I’m a helluva nail-biter and despite my handicap I deal with day to day life. I don’t ask to be treated any differently than a normal person
I once read that the nail also serves as an anchor to keep fingertip skin from sliding around.
My physical anthropolgy professor in college said that fingernails also help to increase tactile sensitivity at the fingertips by providing a flat surface to even out the pressure on the opposite side of the fingerpad.
It does, sort of. I’ve always clipped my nails very short, and for a few days after clipping, gripping anything with the fingertips is painful because the skin gets shoved back onto what’s left of the nail.
Hope that makes any sense.