English grammar: how to compare

As I mention in almost every post, I’m a big fan of comprehensible input. Although I think that grammar is overrated by a lot of students, I still think it’s a useful tool that can help speed up the learning process. These posts about English grammar are not made to give you every possible explanation and example in the world with lots of technical words. They’re made to give you simple explanations with practical examples that you’ll come across on an almost daily basis. Hopefully, you can start putting them into practice straight away!

The idea of comparing is not incredibly difficult, but there are still a few rules to follow. Knowing these little rules will really help you enhance your English and make you sound more like a native. Comparing things in life is not something that is exclusive to English. This is something that is common in every language, and it’s something that you will likely encounter in your daily life.

Comparative adjectives:

This is a completely terrifying drawing that I made in PowerPoint (please don’t judge my artistic skills; I’m here to give language advice instead of artistic advice 😉). Based on this image, we could write this sentence:

Jordan is tall, but Tom is taller.

In order to compare, we can use comparative adjectives. In this example, Jordan is described as being tall. This is a normal adjective that describes Jordan. However, Tom is taller. This is called a comparative adjective. Another way we could write this sentence is:

Tom is taller than Jordan.

In this sentence, we haven’t included the original adjective (tall); we’ve just used the comparative adjective (taller) and the word than. Let’s look at some other examples:

Let’s buy this bottle because it’s bigger than that one.

Jack is better than me at tennis.

The blue house is more expensive than the red house, but it is less expensive than the green house.

This exam is more important than the last one.

Comparative adjectives are generally used when there is a total of two ‘things’ that we’re comparing. Let’s look at those examples again:

Tom is taller than Jordan. (Two people in total)

Let’s buy this bottle because it’s bigger than that one. (Two bottles in total)

Jack is better than me at tennis. (Two people in total)

The blue house is more expensive than the red house, but it is less expensive than the green house. (The first part of the sentence compares the blue and the red house, so two houses in total. The second part of the sentence compares the blue and green house, so two houses in total again)

This exam is more important than the last one. (Two exams in total)

How to form comparative adjectives:

• We usually add “-er” to one-syllable adjectives (tall à taller, old à older)
• If the adjective ends in a vowel and a consonant, we double the consonant (big à bigger, fat à fatter)
• If the adjective ends in an “-e”, we usually just add an “r” (nice à nicer, fine à finer)
• If the adjective ends in a consonant and “-y”, we change the “-y” to an “-i” and add “-er” (happy à happier, funny à funnier)
• For most adjectives with two syllables and all adjectives with three or more syllables, we add the word “more” before the adjective (careful à more careful, interesting à more interesting)
• There are some adjectives with two syllables where we can add either “-er”/”-r”/”more” and they are all correct (handsome à handsomer/more handsome, simple à simpler/more simple, stupid à stupider/more stupid)
• There are some adjectives that have irregular comparative adjectives that don’t follow the rules, and you must simply learn them (good à better, bad à worse, far à farther/further)
• After the comparative adjective, we use the word “than”

Superlative adjectives:

Whereas comparative adjectives compare two things, superlative adjectives generally compare more. In these situations, the superlative adjective is used to highlight the absolute highest or absolute lowest quality of something.

Here, we could say:

Tom is taller than Jordan and Kelvin.

This is using the comparative adjective from before, and this isn’t a problem. However, it’s more common to use the superlative adjective:

Tom is the tallest.

This means that within this group, Tom is taller than everybody else because he is the tallest. Equally, we could also say that Kelvin is the smallest.

We can use superlatives to make factual comments about something:

I have 5 brothers, and I am the oldest.

Of all my friends, I am the smallest.

China has the largest population, with over a billion people.

We can also use superlatives to emphasize the significance of something:

That was the best day of my life.

This is the saddest I’ve ever been.

This is the tastiest pizza in the world.

How to form superlative adjectives:

You’ll notice that these rules are incredibly similar to those for comparative adjectives, just with slightly different endings.

• We usually add “-est” to one-syllable adjectives (tall à tallest, old à oldest)
• If the adjective ends in a vowel and a consonant, we double the consonant (big à biggest, fat à fattest)
• If the adjective ends in an “-e”, we usually just add an “st” (nice à nicest, fine à finest)
• If the adjective ends in a consonant and “-y”, we change the “-y” to an “-i” and add “-est” (happy à happiest, funny à funniest)
• For most adjectives with two syllables and all adjective with three or more syllables, we add the word “most” before the adjective (careful à most careful, interesting à most interesting)
• There are some adjectives with two syllables where we can add either “-est”/”-st”/”most” and they are all correct (handsome à handsomest/most handsome, simple à simplest/most simple, stupid à stupidest/most stupid)
• There are some adjectives that have irregular superlative adjectives that don’t follow the rules, and you must simply learn them (good à best, bad à worst, far à farthest/furthest)

Summary:

Hopefully, these little rules will give you a better idea of how to use comparatives and superlatives when you’re practicing your English. These are incredibly common, and you'll come across them a lot, so it’s definitely worth trying to understand how they're formed. You don’t have to sit and endlessly study every single example on Earth, but if you can get a general idea of how they work, you'll start to notice them when you read, listen, and eventually speak!