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# Adjectives and Adverbs

More adjectives or adverbs? Adverbs can over emphasise the verb when the better thing to do is to build up the nouns. Thanks to : https\://edu.gcfglobal.org/en/grammar/adjectives-and-adverbs/1/

### Adjectives and adverbs

Adjectives and adverbs are both words that **describe** something. If anyone has ever asked you to describe something in detail, you probably used some adverbs and adjectives along the way. But it can be easy to mix them up and forget which is which, so it's important to know how each one is used.

### **What is an adjective?**

An adjective is a word that **describes a noun**. In other words, it tells us more about a particular person, place, or thing.

![image](https://media.gcflearnfree.org/ctassets/modules/45/adj_cupcake3.png)

Adjectives also make it easy to understand **which thing** you're talking about. In the example above, the word **pink** describes **a particular cupcake**. So **pink** is an adjective. If one cupcake was larger than the others, we could have said it was the **big** cupcake.

#### **What is an adverb?**

An adverb is a word that **describes a verb**. Just like adjectives, adverbs are used to add detail to a sentence. More specifically, adverbs tell us **how**, **when**, or **where** something happened.

![image](https://media.gcflearnfree.org/ctassets/modules/45/adj_deeply.png)

In the example above, the word **deeply** describes **how** **he was** **staring**, so deeply is an adverb. In this sentence, it means he was staring in a deep way. If his staring had been weird, we could have said he was staring **weirdly**.

### Using adjectives and adverbs

You know adjectives and adverbs are both words that describe something. But for many people, these words are also easy to mix up. Thankfully, there are some simple rules that will help you know which is which and when to use them.

### **Look at the context**

If you're not sure whether to use an adverb or an adjective, try to figure out what you're describing. Remember, adjectives are used to describe nouns, which means they can explain **what kind** of thing you have, **how many** things you have, or **which** **thing** you're talking about.

Adverbs, on the other hand, are used to describe verbs, which means they can explain **how** something happened, **when** something happened, or **where** something happened.

### **Look at the ending**

You might have already noticed that many adverbs end with the letters **ly***.* If you see a word that ends in **ly***,* there's a good chance it's an adverb, not an adjective. Can you use this rule to tell what's wrong with this sentence?

![image](https://media.gcflearnfree.org/ctassets/modules/45/adj_quick1.png)

Because it doesn't have an **ly** ending, you might have guessed that **quick** is an adjective. However, this sentence is incorrect because an adjective can't be used to describe a verb (**drove**).

To make this sentence correct, we could change the adjective to an adverb: He drove **quickly**. Now the sentence describes how he was driving.

### **Look at the placement**

Here's an easy way to know where to put an adjective in a sentence. It will usually appear just **before** the noun it's describing. By contrast, an adverb will usually appear right **after** the verb it's describing.

![image](https://media.gcflearnfree.org/ctassets/modules/45/adj_giraffe_green.png)

Unfortunately, placement doesn't **always** tell you if something is an adverb or adjective. For example, is **sassy** an adjective or adverb in the image below?

![image](https://media.gcflearnfree.org/ctassets/modules/45/adj_sassy1.png)

Even though it's right next to a verb (***is***), **sassy** is an adjective because it describes the magician. And while adjectives are usually close to the words they describe, adverbs can move around more freely in a sentence. For example, you might see an adverb at the beginning of a sentence.

![image](https://media.gcflearnfree.org/ctassets/modules/45/adj_frankly.png)

Here, **frankly** is an adverb, but it doesn't describe any specific verb in the sentence. Instead, it means the entire sentence will be spoken in a frank, or direct, way. If he was more optimistic, he might have said, **Hopefully, it will all work out***.*

### Common adverbs and adjectives

A lot of adjectives and adverbs are actually based on the same word, which is one reason they’re sometimes difficult to tell apart. Here's a list of the adjectives and adverbs you'll see the most:

![](https://media.gcflearnfree.org/ctassets/modules/45/adj_chart_red.png)

You can also place an adverb between the word **to** and a verb. This is called a **split infinitive**. In the past, this was considered a serious grammatical error, but it's commonly used and accepted today.

![image](https://media.gcflearnfree.org/ctassets/modules/45/adj_bravely2.png)