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Understanding Adjective Order

This document discusses the order of adjectives in English. It provides the following guidelines: 1. When using two adjectives, a general opinion adjective like "good" usually comes before a specific opinion adjective like "tasty". 2. Adjectives indicating size, shape, color, age, nationality, or material usually come after opinion adjectives. 3. Certain adjectives like "ill", "glad", and "-ed" adjectives are usually only used after linking verbs like "be". 4. While three adjectives in a row is possible, more than three is very unusual in English.

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90 views3 pages

Understanding Adjective Order

This document discusses the order of adjectives in English. It provides the following guidelines: 1. When using two adjectives, a general opinion adjective like "good" usually comes before a specific opinion adjective like "tasty". 2. Adjectives indicating size, shape, color, age, nationality, or material usually come after opinion adjectives. 3. Certain adjectives like "ill", "glad", and "-ed" adjectives are usually only used after linking verbs like "be". 4. While three adjectives in a row is possible, more than three is very unusual in English.

Uploaded by

T. JHON
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd

Adjective order

[Link]
english-grammar-reference/adjective-
order

Level: intermediate

Two adjectives
We often have two adjectives in front of a noun:

a  handsome young  man


a  big black car
that horrible big dog

Some adjectives give a general opinion. We can use these adjectives to describe almost any
noun:

good nice awful


bad beautiful important
lovely brilliant wonderful
strange excellent nasty

He's a good/wonderful/brilliant/bad/dreadful teacher.

That's a good/wonderful/brilliant/bad/dreadful book.

Some adjectives give a specific opinion. We only use these adjectives to describe particular
kinds of noun, for example:
Food Furniture, buildings People, animals

clever
delicious comfortable
intelligent
tasty uncomfortable
friendly

We usually put a general opinion in front of a specific opinion:

nice tasty soup
a  nasty uncomfortable armchair
a  lovely intelligent animal

We usually put an opinion adjective in front of a descriptive adjective:

a  nice red dress
a  silly old  man
those horrible yellow curtains
Order of adjectives 1
Order of adjectives 2

Adjectives after link verbs


We use some adjectives only after a link verb:

afraid ill
alive ready
alone sorry
asleep sure
content unable
glad well

Some of the commonest -ed adjectives are normally used only after a link verb:

annoyed
bored
finished
pleased
thrilled

We say:

Our teacher was ill.


My uncle was  very glad when he heard the news.
The policeman seemed to be  very annoyed.

but we do not say:

We had an  ill teacher.
When he heard the news he was a very glad uncle.
He seemed to be a very annoyed policeman.
Order of adjectives 3

Level: advanced

Three or more adjectives


Sometimes we have three adjectives in front of a noun, but this is unusual:

a  nice handsome young man     


a  big black American car     
that horrible big fierce  dog

It is very unusual to have more than three adjectives.

Adjectives usually come in this order:

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

General Specific Shap Colou


Size Age Nationality Material
opinion opinion e r

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