Order of adjectives

An adjective is a word that describes a noun. In the phrase red car, red is an adjective. Sometimes we use several adjectives to describe a noun. Example: a small, red, German car.
When we use more than one adjective before a noun, the adjectives need to be in a particular order.
Most native speakers simply do it naturally. If you want your English to sound more natural, you must use the adjectives in the proper order.

Determiner

Determiners usually come before adjectives. Articles (a, the), possessives (my, his, her, its), demonstratives (this, that, these, those) and numbers (one, three, five) are determiners.

1
Determiner
qualifier
all, both, some, any
article
a/an, the
demonstrative
this, that, these, those
possessive
my, his, her, its
number
two, five, 9

Opinion adjectives

Opinion is what someone thinks about something. These adjectives always come before fact adjectives.

2
Opinion
good, bad, beautiful, interesting

Fact adjectives

Fact adjectives give us true information about something. For example, they tell us how old someone is, or where something is from. We can use several fact adjectives before a noun. In this case, we put them in a particular order. The table shows the standard order of fact adjectives.

3
Size
small, huge, big, tall
4
Shape
round, square, thin
5
Condition
cold, hot, hungry, dirty
6
Age
old, young, new
7
Colour
red, blue, purple
8
Origin
Azeri, British, Chinese
9
Material
plastic, glass, silver
10
Purpose
fishing, tennis, cleaning

Examples:

  • a short white cotton dress [1 – 3 – 7 – 9]
  • two  tall, modern, office buildings  [1 – 3 – 6 – 10]
  • a good-looking young man [1 – 2 – 6]
  • this brown, wooden, dinner table [1 – 7 – 9 – 10]
  • a broken, Chinese, flower vase  [1 – 5 – 8 – 10]



Order of adjectives

Grammar Cards

Order of adjectives

Order of adjectives

Comments

  1. This page is quite helpful to learn adjectives, there are so many types of adjectives in English language world.

    ReplyDelete

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