Adjectives: forms

Unlike in many other languages, adjectives in English do not change (agree) with the noun that they modify:

All new foreign students are welcome to join the clubs and societies.

Not: ~~All new foreigns students~~ …

Every room was painted in different colours.

Not: … ~~in differents colours~~.

There is no general rule for making adjectives. We know they are adjectives usually by what they do (their function) in a sentence. However, some word endings (suffixes) are typical of adjectives.

suffix	examples
-able, -ible	comfortable, readable, incredible, invisible
-al, -ial	comical, normal, musical, industrial, presidential
-ful	beautiful, harmful, peaceful, wonderful
-ic	classic, economic, heroic, romantic
-ical	aeronautical, alphabetical, political
-ish	British, childish, Irish, foolish
-ive, -ative	active, alternative, creative, talkative
-less	endless, motionless, priceless, timeless
-eous, -ious, -ous	spontaneous, hideous, ambitious, anxious, dangerous, famous
-y	angry, busy, wealthy, windy

Warning:

Adjectives ending in -ic and -ical often have different meanings:

The economic policy of this government has failed.

A diesel car is usually more economical than a petrol one.

See also:

Some adjectives are made from nouns and verbs by adding suffixes.

noun	adjective
hero	heroic
wind	windy
child	child*ish*
beauty	beauti*ful*

verb	adjective
read	read*able*
talk	talkat*ive*
use	use*ful*
like	like*able*

I hate windy days.

San Francisco is a very hilly place.

Some words ending in -ly can be both adjectives and adverbs. These include daily, early, monthly, weekly, nightly, yearly:

Adjective: She gets a weekly payment from her parents. (She gets money every week.)

Adverb: I pay my rent weekly. (I pay my rent every week.)

Some words ending in -ly are only adjectives and not adverbs. These include: costly, cowardly, deadly, friendly, likely, lonely, lovely, oily, orderly, scholarly, silly, smelly, timely, ugly, woolly.

We enjoyed the trip to America but it was a costly holiday.

Oily fish is very healthy because it contains omega 3.

See also:

Prefixes such as un-, in-, im-, il- and ir- change the meaning of adjectives. Adding these prefixes makes the meaning negative:

un-	in-	ir-
fair – unfair	active – inactive	responsible – irresponsible
happy – unhappy	appropriate – inappropriate	regular – irregular
sure – unsure	complete – incomplete	reducible – irreducible

im-	il-
balance – imbalance	legal – illegal
polite – impolite	legible – illegible
possible – impossible	logical – illogical

See also:

Many one-syllable adjectives have endings to show the comparative and superlative.

base form	comparative	superlative
fine	finer	fin*est*
young	younger	young*est*
small	smaller	small*est*

Some two-syllable adjectives which end in an unstressed syllable also have these endings.

base form	comparative	superlative
easy	eas*ier*	eas*iest*
funny	funn*ier*	funn*iest*
gentle	gentler	gentl*est*

However, we do not use these endings with two-syllable adjectives ending in a stressed syllable nor with longer adjectives with more than two syllables. The comparatives and superlatives of these adjectives are formed using more and most.

base form	comparative	superlative
complete	*more* complete Not: ~~completer~~	*most* complete Not: ~~completest~~
interesting	*more* interesting Not: ~~interestinger~~	*most* interesting Not: ~~interestingest~~

base form

comparative

superlative

complete

more complete Not: ~~completer~~

most complete Not: ~~completest~~

interesting

more interesting

Not: ~~interestinger~~

most interesting

Not: ~~interestingest~~

See also:

Comparative and superlative adjectives

We use the -ing and -ed forms of regular and irregular verbs as adjectives:

verb	example
annoy	My brother is five and he’s so annoying.
amaze	The Grand Canyon is an amazing* place.*
boil	Be careful! That’s boiling* water!*
excite	This film is not very exciting, is it?

verb	example
bore	Why do teenagers always look bored?
pack	James Bond movies are always action-packed.
smoke	Not everyone likes smoked* salmon.*
make	My dress is hand-made. I really like it.
teach	My Master’s degree was a taught* course.*
excite	I feel excited* about my new job.*

Adjectives with -ing and -ed endings have different meanings.

-ing adjectives

-ing adjectives describe the effect

-ed adjectives

-ed adjectives describe how a person feels

The meeting was very boring.

That was an exciting game.

It was shocking to see what the storm had done to the house.

I felt bored at the meeting.

We were really excited about the game.

We were shocked to see what the storm had done to the house.

Warning:

Commonly confused pairs of adjectives ending in -ing and -ed are: interesting, interested; boring, bored; exciting, excited; embarrassing, embarrassed.