Comparative and superlative adverbs

Comparative and superlative adverbs

We use adjectives to describe a noun and adverbs to describe a verb. We form most adverbs by adding -ly to the adjective: bad - badly, careful - carefully, easy - easily. Some adverbs don’t end in -ly:good - well, fast - fast, hard - hard, late - late.

We can use the comparative or superlative form of adverbs to compare actions. She drives fast, but I drive faster. He plays well, but I play better than him. Compare actions

The adverbs that are formed by adding -ly to the adjective (adverbs of manner) take more to form the comparative and the most to form the superlative. She speaks more quietly than her boss. He cooks well but more slowly than his workmates. The opposite of more is less: Jack did the exam less carefully than Nick.

Adverbs of one or two syllables are like adjectives; they take -er in the comparative and -est in the superlative (early-earlier, late-later, fast-faster, hard-harder, etc.)He works harder than me. She always arrives later than her boss.

The comparative form of the adverb well is better: My sister speaks English better than my dad. The comparative form of the adverb badly is worse: I did much worse in the exam than Mike.

We can also use often to compare things: I play football more often than volleyball. We can also use (not) as + adverb + as to compare things: Jane talks as loud as Paula. (=They both talk loudly)Nick doesn’t write as quickly as Mary. (Mary writes more quickly than Nick)We use superlative adverbs to compare one thing with two or more things: My granny walks the most slowly in our family.

We use most with adverbs that finish in -ly: Of all our teachers, our maths teacher speaks the most quickly. The opposite of most is least: Kevin did his exam the least carefully. We add -est to fast, hard and late. Jason ran the fastest, so he won the race.

The superlative form of the adverb well is the best: My grandma cooks the best in my house. The superlative form of the adverb badly is the worst: None of the teams played very well, but our team played the worst. We can also use often to compare things: When I was young, I played tennis the most often.