Adjective Order Rule: Meaning and Examples

Adjective order in English sentences refers to the proper arrangement of adjectives in a sentence in order to make the sentence sound natural and meaningful. Following the widely accepted adjective order rule will also make your sentences grammatically correct.

For many native speakers of English, the arrangement of adjectives in the right order comes naturally. This task, however, is a big challenge for most people who learn, speak and write English as a second language.

Are you one of those struggling to get it right when it comes to properly ordering adjectives in an English sentence? Would you like to master how to arrange adjectives in an acceptable order? Then you are in the right place.

A few moments from now, you can, once and for all, learn how to correctly order adjectives in any English sentence. 

I am going to teach you how native English speakers order adjectives in a sentence. In other words, you will learn the basic adjective order rule that a lot of English as a Second Language (ESL) learners are taught to follow.

This will be supported by examples of adjective order. 

Finally, I will give you a simple fun formula that you can apply to easily remember the correct order of adjectives.

I trust that with this knowledge, it will be easier for you to answer any tricky question on adjective order on any day.

Are you ready? Let’s start.

Example of an Adjective Order Question

Choose the most suitable arrangement of adjectives to complete the sentence below.

Onny Michael is a … star.

A. movie, dark-skinned, Nigerian, versatile, tall

B. versatile, tall, dark-skinned, Nigerian, movie

C. tall, Nigerian, dark=skinned, versatile, movie

Come back at the end of this lesson to check if you got your answer right.

Practice Test: Adjective Order Exercise 1

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Adjectives in a Noun Phrase

First of all, it is important to understand that the adjectives we are referring to are those that form part of a noun phrase.

In most cases, at least one or two adjectives precede the headword (a noun) in a noun phrase. Here is an example.

He left you a funny-looking, big, brown, army hat.

• The noun phrase is ‘a funny-looking big, brown army hat’.
• ‘hat’ is the noun
• all the others in bold lettering are qualifying the noun.

PLEASE NOTE. Throughout this tutorial, I will use the terms ‘modify’ and ‘qualify’ as well as their derivatives interchangeably.

With that out of the way, let’s continue.

When Adjective Order in English Matters

Where you have a single adjective functioning as a premodifier of a noun, there is no need to talk about adjective order.

Here is an example:

Mustapha bought a mobile phone.

‘Mobile’ is the adjective here. And it needs no arranging.

But as soon as you have two or more adjectives within a noun phrase it becomes a bit difficult to arrange those adjectives in the most acceptable and natural-sounding order.

Take this sentence with a blank for example. How will you arrange the adjectives below it.

Behind Julia were … agents.

elderly, smart, South African, estate, tall, two, fair-skinned, muscular, 

Well, this is why you need to know the adjective order rule. 

Do not forget to come back to correctly arrange the above adjectives after going through this tutorial.

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Other Qualifiers in a Noun Phrase

Besides the well-known descriptive adjectives, other modifiers also appear often in noun phrases. These words also function as modifiers within the noun phrase. 

For that matter, I will include them in stating the rule regarding the proper order of adjectives within a noun phrase.

Here they are.

• Predeterminers. Examples: only, both

• Determiners. Example: the, a, an

• Ordinals. Examples: first, second, sixth, last

• Cardinals. Examples: two, three, four, five

Classification of Adjectives in a Noun Phrase

Adjectives can be classified according to the attributes of the particular noun they are qualifying.

It is these types of adjectives and the best way of arranging them that are under consideration in this tutorial about adjective order in Engish.

The Cambridge Dictionary mentions at least 10 different kinds of attributes of nouns.

Though it is rare to have all these types of adjectives showing up in any single sentence, it is never entirely impossible.

This is why you need to know how to arrange adjectives if all these types were to be present in a single sentence.

Here are the various types of adjectives that may be used as part of a noun phrase.

Opinion (kind, nice, handsome, lovely)

Size (large, tiny, big, small)

Physical quality (coarse, rough, smooth, hard, shiny)

Shape (square, rectangular, circular, round)

Age (old, ancient, young, middle-aged)

Colour (yellow, dark-sinned, brown, black)

Nationality (Origin) (Phillipino, Gambian, Liberian, Sierra Leonean, German, Italian)

Make (Material) (leather, paper, plastic, wooden, clay)

Use (Purpose)( school, as in school bag; shopping, as in shopping mall, music as in music machine)

If we bring together the first set of modifiers above and this second set of adjectives we will have 14 modifiers that can appear in a noun phrase. 

They will all come right before the noun that they qualify.

But the question is this. In which order must we, as a rule, arrange these adjectives in English?

Now comes our answer.

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Adjective Order in English Rule

Here is the acceptable order in which adjectives are arranged within a noun phrase. 

As a student of English as a Second Language (ESL) or as an examination candidate writing an English Language test paper, you need to remember this order of adjectives.

Assuming that a sentence like the one below contains all the types of adjectives, this is the correct order in which you must arrange them.

• Anna gave me … bags she brought from the supermarket.

shopping, dirty, two, Vietnamese, tiny, only, ancient, round, blue, unattractive, the, leather,  

Note that the FIRST adjective type refers to the farthest from the noun ‘bag’ and the TENTH one is the closest to it.

FIRST: Predeterminer

SECOND: Determiner

THIRD: Ordinal

FOURTH: Cardinal

FIFTH: Opinion

SIXTH: Size

SEVENTH: Physical quality

EIGHTH: Shape

NINTH: Age

TENTH: Colour

ELEVENTH: Nationality/Origin

TWELFTH: Make/Material

THIRTEENTH: Use/Purpose

How to Easily Remember the Adjective Order Rule

Here now comes the fun part I promised you.

Try to memorize the below syllables and words in that order and in any way you can.

As you can see, they respectively stand for predeterminer, determiner, ordinal, cardinal, opinion, size, physical quality, shape. colour, nationality, make and use.

PRE, DE, OR, CA PI, SI, PHY, SHA. AGE  COLOUR NATIONALITY MAKE AND USE

ProTip: Say the first part and pause. Then follow it with the second part in bold lettering. That’s it. 

Now if you can assign the right words to the various types of adjectives then you can easily arrange any number of adjectives that form part of a noun phrase; and a sentence for that matter.

Order of Adjectives Examples

Here are a few sentences to illustrate what you’ve learned so far regarding adjective order in English.

That’s certainly an expensive, big, Swiss gold wristwatch.

She is my only young foreign blogger friend.

How can I thank you enough for this lovely, French, white, silk wedding gown?

Our ESL teacher is a handsome, neat, brown-haired, Canadian athlete.

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Final Thoughts

It should now be much easier for you to arrange adjectives in the right order no matter how many types you have been given to work with. 

If you wish to download more examples of sentences that illustrate the arrangement of the various types of adjectives and other modifiers within a noun phrase then visit THIS PAGE. 

There are similar English grammar tutorials on this site. 

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