Adjectives
Comparatives, Superlatives, Meaning, Form, Position and Stylistic Choice
Explore how adjectives describe, qualify, compare and intensify meaning — from basic attributive and predicative functions to sophisticated comparative and superlative structures.
Key considerations
Learners are generally more concerned with the meaning of specific adjectives than with their grammar. Where the grammar does cause difficulty, it is usually one of three things.
Ordering
Sequencing two or more adjectives that occur together, e.g. deciding between a large French car and a French large car.
Comparison
Constructing comparative and superlative forms correctly — knowing when to add -er/-est and when to use more/most.
Combinability
Deciding what can be used directly before or after an adjective — where very is possible, and where an infinitive such as to eat can follow.
The adjective architecture
Nine terms recur throughout this lesson. Click any one to see how it fits into the wider system.
A note on this lesson
Adjectives are often introduced as simple ‘describing words’, and comparatives and superlatives as a matter of adding -er and -est. Both descriptions are true as far as they go, but they understate real usage considerably. This lesson works through the full architecture of the adjective — its form, its position, its internal phrase structure, its gradability, and the comparative and superlative system built on top of it — using the terminology and distinctions that support genuinely advanced control of the word class.
What do they do?
Adjectives characteristically qualify nouns, noun phrases and, in certain constructions, clauses by specifying qualities, properties or evaluative characteristics.
| NOUN | an old film |
| NOUN PHRASE | an interesting experience for everyone |
| NOUN CLAUSE | it’s unbelievable that we haven’t seen each other for so long |
Adjectives provide much of the ‘colour’ in any description. The following passage introduces the classic film Deliverance to television viewers; the adjectives are set in italics.
John Boorman’s provocative, violent and compelling thriller takes American poet James Dickey’s novel to giddy heights of suspenseful stress and proves that Burt Reynolds can act. Central to the success of Boorman’s culture clash nightmare, and what makes it resonate with such a rare intensity, is the powerful theme of red-blooded masculinity under hostile threat.
Apart from central, every adjective in this review comes before the noun it qualifies, as part of the noun phrase — we return to this passage under Position, below.
Adjectives related to nouns or verbs
A great many adjectives are morphologically related to a noun or a verb from which they were historically formed.
| beautiful | ← beauty (noun) |
| dangerous | ← danger (noun) |
| drinkable | ← drink (verb) |
| talkative | ← talk (verb) |
Suffixes and prefixes
These adjectives often carry one of the following suffixes. Sometimes, as in the case of impeccable, the adjective survives long after the noun or verb it was related to has been forgotten.
| Suffix | Example | Suffix | Example | Suffix | Example |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| -able | impeccable | -ent | intelligent | -ory | obligatory |
| -al | paternal | -ful | truthful | -ous | courageous |
| -ate | immaculate | -ist | Communist | -some | winsome |
| -an | Anglican | -ive | impressive | -wise | streetwise |
| -ant | fragrant | -less | useless | -y | misty |
The prefixes non-, pro- and anti- can attach to the beginning of some nouns, and the suffixes -like and -friendly to the end, to create further adjective forms.
a pro-/anti-democracy movement · a business-like manner · a user-friendly computer manual
What do they look like?
Beyond simple roots, adjectives regularly appear as participle forms and as multiword (compound) constructions.
Participle forms
In the pair boring / bored, both words are parts of the verb (to) bore: boring is the present participle and bored is the past participle. Many adjectives share their form with participles in exactly this way (e.g. boring, bored, broken, closed, exciting, excited).
Am I boring you?
Multiword adjectives
Multiword or ‘compound’ adjectives are made up of two parts, usually connected by a hyphen. The second part is often a past participle form.
| Pattern | Examples |
|---|---|
| Adverb + past participle | well-liked, well-intentioned |
| Noun + past participle | feather-brained, self-centred, people-oriented |
Adjectives are also derived from multiword verbs (e.g. wear someone out, tie someone up); here the first part is usually a past participle form.
wear...out → worn-out · tie...up → tied-up
Other multiword adjectives do not involve a participle form at all, as with two-piece, birds-eye and slip-on below.
His two-piece birds-eye suit is impressive, his blue shirt with its rounded collar immaculate, his thin, faintly European slip-on shoes impeccable.
Notice that is has been omitted before immaculate, and are before impeccable, to avoid repetition — we return to this kind of ellipsis under Special Structures.
Adjectives do not change before plural nouns
two green books NOT two greens books
Unlike in many languages, English adjectives carry no plural inflection of their own.
Where do adjectives come in sentences?
Single adjectives occupy one of two usual sentence positions: before a noun, within the noun phrase, or after a noun (or pronoun) and a verb.
The same adjective, two functions
an ambitious proposal
Before the noun, ambitious sits inside the noun phrase itself, characterising proposal directly.
Before a noun
When adjectives come before nouns, they are usually the last-but-one item in the noun phrase — the noun itself completes the phrase.
| Determiner | Intensifier | Adjective | Noun |
|---|---|---|---|
| some | — | enchanted | evening |
| a | very | old | story |
We can usually leave an attributive adjective out of a noun phrase without making nonsense of the sentence. A small number of adjectives, however, can only be used before a noun.
I watched the entire performance. NOT The performance was entire.
After a noun or pronoun and verb
We also use adjectives after nouns (‘predicatively’). Here a complement verb links the adjective to the noun or pronoun it qualifies.
| Complement verb | Adjective | |
|---|---|---|
| He | is | cold. |
| It | ’s getting | dark. |
Used predicatively, an adjective usually expresses the main point of the clause, and cannot be left out. A small number of adjectives (e.g. alive, asleep, awake) are used only after nouns.
She’s asleep. NOT We found an asleep child in a basket on our doorstep.
Exceptional positions
After object–complement verbs
Object–complement verbs are followed by an object (often a noun or pronoun) and then a complement (often an adjective), which describes something about the object.
| Verb | Object | Complement | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Don’t | make | me | angry. |
| He | left | the door | open. |
Ellipsis
Adjectives also follow immediately after nouns when something has been left out of the sentence — usually a relative pronoun (who, which, that) together with a form of (to) be. This is particularly common after something, someone, somewhere, sometime and anything.
| Pronoun | Adjective | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| You should wear | something | warm. | (i.e. something which is warm) |
| Take me | somewhere | nice. | (i.e. somewhere which is nice) |
A form of (to) be can also be left out simply to avoid repetition — recall the Deliverance-style description above, where is was omitted before immaculate and are before impeccable.
The internal structure of the adjective phrase
An adjective rarely stands entirely alone. It typically forms the head of an adjective phrase, optionally preceded by a modifier and optionally followed by a complement.
very proud of her achievement
Modifier
Adverbs with adjectives
We often use adverbs of manner before adjectives — especially, though not necessarily, those formed from present or past participles — to narrow the meaning of the adjective and make it more precise.
a rapidly degenerating condition · a carefully worded agreement
Adjectives followed by prepositions, infinitives and that
When we use adjectives predicatively, we can sometimes follow them with a preposition, an infinitive, or a that-clause.
unaware of speaking · happy to learn · eager that you should go
A few adjectives can only be used if followed by a preposition — they cannot stand alone.
I’m fond of him. NOT I’m fond.
Adjective + preposition explorer
Filter by preposition. Sources such as the Cambridge Advanced Learner’s Dictionary remain the most reliable check for any specific adjective, since more than one preposition is sometimes possible.
Adjective + infinitive builder
Good, bad, easy, difficult, usual, unusual, wise and foolish — and adjectives with similar meanings — are among those normally followed by an infinitive.
It would be wise to leave early.
Adjective + that-clause
Click to reveal how the adjective and the following clause relate.
It is surprising that he left.
The adjective surprising expresses an evaluative reaction; the that-clause supplies the proposition being reacted to. The same pattern accounts for the earlier example eager that you should go, where eager licenses a following that-clause containing should.
Adjective phrases as verbless clauses
Occasionally, adjectives appear to follow the noun they qualify, forming a phrase that extends the information given by the noun. Such examples may also be classified as ‘verbless clauses’. Although learners at any level may encounter constructions like this, it is probably only at very high levels that we would want to teach them explicitly.
It has all the grip, technical and intellectual, that you would expect.
Here technical and intellectual forms a phrase extending the grip, describing a musician’s piano technique.
Gradable and ungradable adjectives
Whether an adjective can be intensified, and by what kind of word, depends on whether the quality it describes is gradable, extreme, or absolute.
Gradable adjectives
Gradable adjectives describe qualities we can measure or grade in some way. Things can be wet, cold, interesting or disappointing to different degrees; we can say something is quite wet, very wet or terribly wet. Gradable adjectives include calm, flexible, happy, ill and jealous.
We use intensifiers (e.g. very) and downtoners (e.g. fairly, rather) with gradable adjectives.
A very irritating development. · She’s fairly certain.
Ungradable adjectives
Some adjectives express extreme qualities (terrified, furious, starving) or absolute qualities (alive, correct, dead, male, human). With these ungradable adjectives we use only intensifiers that stress the extreme or absolute nature of the quality — we do not use downtoners.
He’s utterly terrified. NOT He’s very terrified.
She’s completely dead. NOT She’s fairly dead.
An interactive degree scale
Drag the point along the scale to see how downtoners, intensifiers, and an extreme synonym combine with a single gradable adjective.
Note that freezing behaves as an extreme adjective rather than a further degree of cold reached simply by intensifying: it combines naturally with absolutely or utterly, but not with very.
Using more than one adjective
When two or more adjectives occur together, their order, punctuation and linking all follow patterns worth making explicit.
Order
A helpful rule of thumb when two or more adjectives occur before a noun:
- general before specific: a large French car NOT a French large car
- opinion before description: a wonderful high ceiling NOT a high wonderful ceiling
Learners sometimes appreciate more detailed guidance such as the table below — though information this precise is only a rough guide, and is not foolproof.
| 1 Size | 2 Shape | 3 Colour | 4 Origin | 5 Material | 6 Use | Noun | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| a | large | white | loaf | ||||
| a | sleeveless | blue | woollen | pullover | |||
| small | Spanish | serving | dishes |
Try reordering
Tap the words in the pool, in order, to build the most natural noun phrase.
Punctuation
In writing we generally separate adjectives in a list with commas when they all qualify the same noun. We leave the commas out when one adjective qualifies another.
A terrifying, dark, gloomy clearing.
All three adjectives independently qualify clearing.
A pale blue vase.
Pale qualifies blue, not vase, directly.
Which punctuation?
Linking adjectives with and
In theory any number of adjectives can be used together, although most people avoid long strings of descriptive words, particularly in writing and particularly before a noun.
Before a noun, we don’t need a conjunction to separate the adjectives we put together.
They came to a terrifying, dark, gloomy clearing in the wood.
After a noun (or pronoun), however, we must use and before the last of two or more adjectives.
She was cold and hungry. · She was cold, tired and hungry.
We can also choose to use and before the final item in a list of three or more adjectives used before a noun. Here and emphasises the final adjective, and allows us to change the usual order.
They came to a dark, gloomy and terrifying clearing in the wood.
Comparatives & Superlatives
At the simplest level, comparatives are adjectives and adverbs ending in -er (e.g. bigger, richer, faster), and superlatives are adjectives and adverbs ending in -est (e.g. biggest, richest, fastest). Learners need to know not only when these forms should be used, but when they cannot be — and what to use instead.
We also consider two related structures throughout this section: more/less followed by a noun, adjective or adverb (e.g. more time, more successful, less attentively), and most/least followed by a noun, adjective or adverb (e.g. most time, most successful, least attentively).
How are comparatives and superlatives really used?
Coursebooks tend to teach very idealised patterns. In fact, comparatives and superlatives occur only rarely in these idealised forms; a look at real speech and writing tells a fuller story.
| Maths | was | more difficult | than | spelling. |
Science was easier than maths.
| Everest | is | the | highest | mountain | in the world. |
The most brilliant thing is that now it’s all over.
Neither authentic example is followed by than + Y or type + specific class: the point of comparison, and the class the item belongs to, are both left implicit and recovered from context. Notice too that the appears before only one of the four superlative forms in the fuller table below — best here takes a possessive (your best), not the.
| Comparative structures | Superlative structures |
|---|---|
| I thought they would be a lot harder. | The most brilliant thing is that now it’s all over. |
| They seemed hard at first but easier as you got used to them. | Most important was to divide up the work sensibly. |
| Usually I go to bed about 9pm but it was earlier during SATS. | Science and spelling were easiest. |
| Maths started easy but got harder. | My mum said to me: ‘You just try your best’, and that’s what I did. |
In teaching, we need to draw attention to comparatives and superlatives however they occur, encourage learners to identify information that is only implied, and practise the forms in simple statements and questions (It’s hotter; Who’s the tallest?) as well as in the idealised patterns.
What do they do?
We use comparatives to compare a common feature of two or more things or people, in terms of degree or quantity. We use superlatives to single out one thing or person as special in relation to others, on some kind of implied scale.
Coursebooks usually suggest that comparatives compare exactly two things, and rarely note that we can also compare something with several other things at once, or that the point of comparison is often simply left unsaid.
The Porsche is more expensive than the Toyota and the Renault. · The Porsche is more expensive than all the other cars.
Cars are getting more expensive (than they used to be).
The following comes from a real advertisement for an ice cream called ‘Indulgence’, produced by the British supermarket Sainsbury’s.
To complement its rich flavour, Sainsbury’s Indulgence has a far denser texture than ordinary ice creams.
The comparative here compares ‘Indulgence’ not with one other product, but with the entire class of ‘ordinary ice creams’.
Coursebook exercises sometimes suggest comparatives can compare anything with anything — transforming China is larger than India into India is smaller than China. In fact the second sentence is very unlikely, since neither country is small; China is larger than Switzerland is even more unnatural, since we do not generally compare things at opposite ends of a scale.
Comparative formation
Long adjectives and adverbs
We use more and most before adjectives and adverbs when these words are long — almost always if they have three or more syllables (ex/pen/sive = 3 syllables; con/fi/dent/ly = 4 syllables).
It was the most expensive wine in the shop. · She talks more energetically when she’s with people she knows.
Short adjectives and adverbs
We generally add -er or -est to shorter adjectives and adverbs — almost always if they have only one syllable (fast = 1 syllable).
He drove faster this morning.
Although we may choose not to teach this until a much higher level, we sometimes have to use more/most even with one-syllable adjectives:
- with adjectives that are also past participles (burnt, drunk, forced, lost, spoiled, tired, torn): I’m getting more and more tired.
- with adjectives that are not gradable (dead, male, royal): I feel more dead than I did yesterday.
We also sometimes choose to use more/most with one-syllable adjectives — to make a specific contrast with less, or for ‘one-off’ individual choices.
A: Did she say it was less cold in the north of the country?
B: No. She said it was more cold.
Don’t blame me if you feel more ill when you’ve eaten all that!
Two-syllable adjectives and adverbs
With many two-syllable words (able, clever, common, frosty, happy) we can choose whether to use more/most or to add -er/-est.
Are you feeling happier / more happy?
With other two-syllable words, we have to use more/most. There is often nothing in the spelling or pronunciation that tells us this, but a number of rules of thumb help:
- adverbs ending in -ly (promptly, quickly, thinly): She stood up the most promptly.
- adjectives identical to present or past participles (boiling, boring, damaged, freezing, needed, smiling): Today’s lecture was even more boring than usual.
- adjectives with ‘typical’ adjective endings such as -al, -ant, -ard, -ate, -ect, -ed, -en, -ent, -ful, -id, -ite, -ive, -less, -ous, -some (crucial, dominant, awkward, separate, perfect, gifted, wooden, recent, careful, candid, finite, expensive, careless, gorgeous, loathsome): The most crucial thing is to arrive in good time.
Less and the least
We can use less and the least with all adjectives and adverbs, regardless of the number of syllables.
I was less free in my last job. · Let’s pick the least complicated solution.
However, we often avoid using less, particularly in speech and informal writing. We tend to use not as/so … as instead.
He isn’t as/so keen as he used to be.
Interactive comparative & superlative former
Choose an adjective to see which rule applies to it.
| Adjective | Comparative | Superlative | Rule |
|---|---|---|---|
| small | smaller | smallest | One syllable → add -er/-est. |
Spelling
We often refer casually to ‘-er and -est forms’ (e.g. older, oldest), but in many cases we need slightly different combinations of letters.
+ r / st
Words already ending in e:
brave → braver, bravest
y → i + er/est
Words ending consonant + y:
dry → drier, driest
+ consonant + er/est
Final consonant doubled where the word ends single vowel + single consonant:
fit → fitter · thin → thinner
but NOT calm → calmmer (two consonants), green → greenner (two vowels)
Transform the adjective
Pronunciation
The following endings are normally ‘weak’ — pronounced so rapidly and quietly that they are only just distinguishable in the flow of speech. The vowel sound in both cases is /ə/.
| Ending | Example |
|---|---|
| -er (/ə/) | bigger /ˈbɪgə/ |
| than (/ðən/ or even /ðə/) | bigger than me /ˈbɪgə ðə miː/ |
| -est (/əst/ or /ɪst/) | biggest /ˈbɪgəst/ or /ˈbɪgɪst/ |
We often leave out the final sound /t/ of …est, most and least, particularly when it is followed by a consonant.
| The biggest prize | /ðə ˈbɪgəs praɪz/ |
| The most carefully painted | /ðə məʊs ˈkeəfli/ |
| The least practical suggestion | /ðə liːs ˈpræktɪkl/ |
In words ending in the sound /ŋ/, we add /g/ before the comparative or superlative ending.
long /lɒŋ/ ⇒ longer /ˈlɒŋgə/ (NOT /ˈlɒŋə/)
strong /strɒŋ/ ⇒ strongest /ˈstrɒŋgəst/ (NOT /ˈstrɒŋəst/)
Irregular comparative and superlative forms
| Adjective/Adverb | Comparative | Superlative | Comments |
|---|---|---|---|
| good | better | best | |
| well | better | best | |
| bad | worse | worst | |
| badly | worse | worst | We can also say more/most badly. |
| far | farther / further | farthest / furthest | We use farther and farthest usually for distance only. Further and furthest can also have abstract meaning (e.g. I don’t want to discuss this any further). |
| old | elder | eldest | Older and oldest are the standard forms. We use elder and eldest only for family relationships, and only normally before a noun (my elder brother but NOT My brother is elder than me). |
Comparative structures
A is taller than B.
not as/so difficult as…
as … as
We use as + adjective + as for positive comparison, and not as/so + adjective + as for negative comparison.
as tall as · as important as · not as difficult as · not so difficult as
the + comparative …, the + comparative …
This structure describes complementary processes — as one thing changes, so does another.
Ways of intensifying and downtoning comparative forms
A bit, far and (quite) a lot are used mainly in spoken and informal contexts.
| a bit | barely (any) | hardly (any) |
| a great deal | by far | much |
| a little | considerably | slightly |
| (quite) a lot | far | scarcely (any) |
The project has been a great deal less successful than we had hoped. · I feel a bit happier now than when I last spoke to you.
…er and …er, more and more …
We often repeat the same comparative form, separated by and, usually to emphasise the speed or inevitability of a process — frequently in the pattern get …er and …er.
The traffic’s getting worse and worse.
Exact measurements
We sometimes compare things in terms of exact measurements, specifying the quantity immediately before the comparative form.
It’s thirty per cent / twenty times bigger.
When we use a fraction on its own, we generally don’t use a comparative form — instead we use as + adjective.
It’s half as big.
Superlative structures, and the limits of ‘the’
Superlatives are formed by exactly the rules already given for comparatives — -est for short words, most for long ones, with the same exceptions. What deserves separate attention is where the is, and is not, required.
Rules of thumb (and their limitations)
The with comparatives
‘Don’t use the before the adjective or adverb in comparisons’ is a good rule of thumb for elementary learners. At a later stage, however, we need to consider comparisons where the is used:
- where of the two of them is stated or implied: He is the taller (of the two of them).
- in expressions describing complementary processes, the + comparative …, the + comparative …: The more you eat, the more you want.
The with superlatives
Elementary coursebooks usually teach ‘use the with superlatives’.
She’s easily the most talented of this year’s graduates.
There are, however, plenty of cases where we don’t need — or can’t use — the:
try your best/hardest; do your best require a possessive adjective instead of the.
She tried her hardest.
When the specific instance belongs to a small, finite class that is implied or understood.
Science and spelling were easiest.
In expressions inferring the …est thing (to do) is ….
It’s safest to leave before the rush hour.
In superlative expressions inside defining relative clauses.
Give it to the children who are oldest.
And where the superlative form is an adverb of manner:
Susie writes most clearly.
In and of
We generally use in to relate a superlative item to its ‘class’.
The largest city in South America.
We need to be aware, however, that we use of to relate a superlative item to other items within its class — and at some point may need to teach this explicitly.
The largest of all South American cities.
Relative clauses
We often use superlative expressions immediately before a relative clause. The verb inside that clause is often in the present perfect (or past simple in American English) or the past perfect.
Tell us about the best meal you’ve ever eaten.
It is convenient to revise superlatives at exactly the point where students are practising relative clauses.
Ways of emphasising superlative forms
We use a range of words and expressions before the superlative form of adjectives to make them seem stronger: altogether, by far and away, easily, quite, simply.
She’s easily the best candidate. · It was simply the most wonderful performance I ever heard.
We generally don’t use these before the superlative form of adverbs.
She ran altogether the fastest.
We can also use a number of expressions after comparative and superlative forms, particularly in spoken and informal contexts: by miles, by far, by a long way, by a long chalk.
Hong Kong is more humid than New York by far. · We’ve just played our worst match this season by a long way.
Less and least
As the comparative and superlative of a little, less and least also make statements about quantity, expressed by a following noun.
I have the least financial expertise.
More and most
As the comparative and superlative of a lot/much/many, more and most make the corresponding statements about quantity.
There are more people in British prisons than there were in 1990.
Expressions of quantity
We use more and most, fewer and fewest, and less and least to make statements about quantity — something we can count or measure, usually expressed by a noun. We can think of these as the comparative and superlative forms of quantifiers.
| Quantifier | Comparative | Superlative |
|---|---|---|
| a lot / much / many | more | most |
| a few | fewer | fewest |
| a little | less | least |
Many European cities have problems of traffic congestion, but Athens is supposed to have the most. (problems)
Fewer and fewer school leavers want to study classics.
We generally use most, fewest and least in expressions with have (e.g. have the least financial expertise).
Although we usually teach that less and least cannot be used with countable nouns (less pounds, the least books), this is very common in speech and increasingly common in writing: Groups produce less ideas, in total, than the individuals in those groups working separately. Some people consider this unacceptable in written English.
Adjective choice as a rhetorical resource
Beyond correctness, adjective selection affects emphasis, tone, precision, persuasion, description, academic register and rhetorical effect.
From adequate to precise
Replacing a basic adjective with a more precise one can substantially alter the rhetorical force of a sentence, even where the underlying proposition barely changes.
Stronger still: it implies the argument is difficult to resist or refute, not merely persuasive.
Adjectives in place of adverbs
In both written and spoken English, many people use the comparative or superlative form of an adjective in place of an adverb — particularly with the -er/-est form of one-syllable adjectives. Some people avoid this, particularly in written English.
He walks a lot slower than he did. (a lot more slowly)
She escaped the quickest. (the most quickly)
Pronouns after than
When a pronoun follows than in a comparative structure, it is usually an object pronoun. Some people prefer a subject pronoun followed by an auxiliary verb (or a form of be), particularly in written English.
They are richer than us. · I ran faster than he did. · They are richer than we are.
Adjectives in academic English
Adjective choice contributes directly to hedging, evaluation, precision, objectivity and stance in academic writing — the same descriptive resource examined throughout this lesson, applied to a register that rewards restraint and exactness.
Hedging through gradable adjectives
Downtoners on gradable adjectives moderate a claim without abandoning it.
The results were fairly consistent across cohorts.
Evaluation and stance
Precise evaluative adjectives position the writer relative to the evidence.
A compelling, if not conclusive, body of evidence.
Precision over vagueness
Generic adjectives (good, bad, nice) rarely survive in academic prose.
a good sample → a representative sample
Objectivity and register
Ungradable, absolute adjectives should be reserved for claims the evidence genuinely supports.
a statistically significant difference, not simply a huge difference
Typical difficulties for learners
Drawing on both the adjective system and the comparative/superlative system, the following patterns recur across learner writing and speech.
Comprehension
If a learner’s first language usually places adjectives after nouns, they may need considerable exposure to English before the adjective-before-noun sequence feels automatic — even once they can state the rule, specific instances can wrong-foot them. This causes particular difficulty in listening (in reading, learners can pause to study a phrase), and especially when two or more adjectives precede a noun. In listening, learners may also fail to recognise comparative and superlative forms altogether, particularly given the weak pronunciation of than and the -er/-est endings — bigger and biggest may simply be heard as big, and than as the.
| Difficulty | Typical error |
|---|---|
| Plural adjective forms | They are olds books. |
| Over-generalised comparative/superlative rules | She is more old than me. / That was the reasonablest I’ve ever seen her. |
| Adjective placed after the noun | It is a building very old. |
| Present participle used for past participle | I am very exciting about my trip. |
| Unnatural adjective order | It is an old beautiful building. |
| Conjunction used inappropriately before a noun | They were playing with a big and red ball. |
| Ungradable adjectives intensified as if gradable | She was very furious when she heard the news. |
| Adverb form used in place of an adjective | We will play some softly music. |
| Over-use of more/most where -er/-est is expected | He is more tall than me. / They are more better than us. |
| Over-use of -er/-est, including with long adjectives | I am wearing my goodest pair of shoes. / Minsk is the beautifulest city in my country. |
| Omitting the before a superlative | She’s most important person in my country. |
| more used instead of most in a superlative | She’s the more obstinate child in the class. |
| of used instead of in | China has the largest population of the world. |
| Words confused with than | I work harder that I used to. / She’s older of me. |
The conjunction error above is a genuine source of confusion, since the rule differs according to whether the adjectives come before or after the noun: The ball was big and red. is entirely correct after the noun, even though a big and red ball is not, before it. The plural-adjective and adjective-after-noun errors are particularly common among learners whose first language works the opposite way; the adverb/adjective confusion is especially common among learners whose first language (e.g. Chinese) makes no formal distinction between the two word classes; and the more-for-most substitution is particularly characteristic of learners with a Latin-based first language.
Twenty-five premium assessment questions
A mixed-format assessment testing genuine grammatical understanding of adjectives, comparatives and superlatives — not vocabulary recognition.
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Twenty-five questions across ten interaction types, ordered from upper-intermediate/advanced towards highly challenging. Each answer is followed by an explanation of the underlying grammatical principle, whether you are right or wrong. Your progress is not saved between visits.
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Adjectives, Comparatives and Superlatives
A printable, teacher-oriented worksheet covering identification, position, phrase analysis, gradability, participle forms, comparative and superlative formation, irregular forms, comparative structures, as…as, less/more, the…the, sentence transformation, error correction and stylistic choice — with a separated teacher answer key. This is a distinct print resource, not the 25-question digital assessment above.
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