Adjectives
Adjectives describe or modify nouns — they tell us what something is like. English adjectives are versatile, invariable in form, and follow specific rules of order.
What is an adjective?
An adjective is a word that describes or modifies a noun or pronoun. Adjectives give us information about size, colour, shape, age, origin, material, opinion, and more. In English, adjectives do not change form to agree with the noun — the same word is used regardless of gender or number.
a tall building · three tall buildings (no change in the adjective)
a beautiful day · beautiful weather · beautiful people
The film was long, boring, and predictable.
Two positions of adjectives
An adjective can appear in two places in a sentence, and both are correct:
- Attributive position — directly before the noun it describes: a red car, a clever idea, the old house
- Predicative position — after a linking verb such as be, seem, look, feel, become, appear: The car is red. The idea seems clever. The house looks old.
She is a talented musician. (attributive — before the noun)
The musician is talented. (predicative — after the verb)
Types of adjectives
Adjectives can be grouped by the kind of information they provide. Click any card to explore that type in detail.
Comparative adjectives
Compare two things using -er or more.
bigger, more interesting, better
Superlative adjectives
Identify the extreme in a group using -est or most.
biggest, most interesting, best
Descriptive adjectives
Describe qualities of a noun.
happy, cold, tall, bright, soft
Proper adjectives
Derived from proper nouns; always capitalised.
French, Italian, Shakespearean
Quantitative adjectives
Indicate how many or how much.
some, several, many, few, little
Demonstrative adjectives
Point to specific nouns (before a noun).
this book, that car, these keys, those bags
Order of adjectives
When more than one adjective appears before a noun, English follows a strict order. Native speakers apply this instinctively — breaking the order sounds unnatural even if each adjective is correct on its own.
a lovely little old rectangular green French silver whittling knife
a beautiful big red Italian sports car
three small round wooden beads
Memory aid — OSASCOMP: Opinion · Size · Age · Shape · Colour · Origin · Material · Purpose. In practice, you rarely use more than two or three adjectives before a noun, but knowing the order prevents mistakes like a wooden big table (wrong) vs. a big wooden table (correct).
Adjectives that are always predicative
A small group of adjectives can only follow a linking verb — they cannot appear before a noun.
- afraid, asleep, awake, alive, alone, ashamed, aware, glad, well, unwell
The baby is asleep. ✓ (not: the asleep baby ✗)
She was afraid. ✓ (not: the afraid woman ✗)
He is alive. ✓ (not: the alive man ✗ → say: the living man ✓)
Gradable and non-gradable adjectives
Gradable adjectives describe qualities that can exist to different degrees and can be modified by adverbs like very, quite, extremely: very tall, quite cold, extremely happy.
Non-gradable (absolute) adjectives describe qualities that cannot be measured by degree — they are either true or not. Avoid using very with these:
| Non-gradable adjective | Why it cannot be graded | Instead say |
|---|---|---|
| perfect | Something is either perfect or it isn't | absolutely perfect |
| unique | Either one of a kind or not | truly unique |
| dead | You cannot be "very dead" | completely dead |
| pregnant | Either pregnant or not | — (no intensifier needed) |
| impossible | Either possible or not | absolutely impossible |