Adjectives are words that describe or modify nouns, providing more information about them. They can indicate qualities such as size, color, shape, quantity, and more. For example:

• “The big house” (big describes the house)
• “A red apple” (red describes the apple)
• “Three happy children” (happy describes the children)

Study a list of opposite adjectives here

or watch a video

 

Now play some games

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Prefixes and suffixes can help you understand a word. They give you important information about the word.

Some prefixes give adjectives the opposite meaning:

un– happy – unhappy
im– possible – impossible
dis– satisfied – dissatisfied
ir– regular – irregular
il– legal – illegal

Other prefixes make a word negative:

anti– social – antisocial
non– profit – non-profit

 

Common suffixes for adjectives:

–able – reliable / capable
–al – accidental / universal
–ful – helpful / wonderful
–ous/-ious – dangerous / nervous / religious
–ive – creative / sensitive

 

Go to the bottom of this page and do some exercises.

and now play some games

 

Have a look at some more opposite adjectives formed with the use of prefixes and do the quiz that follows.

You can either study the formation of adjectives with the use of prefixes/suffixes or play with them.

 

Order of adjectives

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 bad lovely strange

nice beautiful brilliant excellent

awful important wonderful 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
delicious tasty	comfortable uncomfortable	clever intelligent 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

Adjectives after link verbs

We use some adjectives only after a link verb:

afraid alive alone asleep content glad

ill ready sorry sure unable 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.

 

For three or more adjectives follow the rules shown in the posters below.

 

There are some exercises with the order of adjectives here (easy) and some in this page  (difficult).

Do a quiz here