What Are Adjectives

An adjective is a word that describes a noun. It tells us what the noun is like — its colour, size, shape, age, mood, origin, or any other quality.

Nouns name things. Adjectives describe them. London is a noun; big, old, and beautiful are adjectives that tell us more about London.

An adjective never stands alone as the main idea — it always exists to add information to a noun.

What adjectives tell us

A single adjective can answer many different questions about a noun: what kind? what colour? what size? how does it feel? Most adjectives fall into a few familiar groups.

Appearance and colour. a tall man, a red door, a blonde child, a dark room.

Size and shape. a big city, a small apartment, a round table, a narrow street.

Age. an old photograph, a new phone, a young teacher.

Feelings and mood. a happy child, a tired driver, an angry customer.

Opinion and quality. a good film, a terrible idea, a wonderful holiday.

Origin. a French restaurant, a Japanese car, an Italian writer.

Adjectives formed from place names stay capitalised — French, Japanese, Italian — because they come from proper nouns.

How adjectives build meaning

Adjectives let you be more specific. Start with a plain noun and add detail one word at a time:

Each adjective narrows the meaning. A car could be anything; a fast red car is a much clearer picture. You can use one adjective, two, or several, depending on how much detail you want to give.

Where adjectives go

Adjectives have two main positions in a sentence.

Before a noun. This is the most common place. The adjective sits directly in front of the word it describes.

After a linking verb such as be, seem, look, or feel. Here the adjective describes the subject through the verb.

Both sentences give the same information about the dress. The position changes, but the adjective still does the same job — it describes the noun. Which position to use, and which adjectives fit which position, is covered separately.

Adjectives vs. determiners

Words like a, the, this, my, and two also appear before nouns, but they are determiners, not adjectives. Determiners point to or specify a noun (which one? whose? how many?). Adjectives describe it (what kind? what like?).

Determiners have their own section in the course, so this lesson focuses only on descriptive adjectives.

Common mistakes

Treating adjectives like nouns

Making adjectives plural

Forgetting to capitalise adjectives of origin

Confusing adjectives with adverbs

Wrong word order with linking verbs