Descriptive adjectives in Spanish

There are three types of adjectives: descriptive, demonstrative and possessive adjectives. In this article, descriptive adjectives are discussed. The other two will be explained in the related sections.

You need to keep in mind three important concepts related to adjectives.

1. Spanish adjectives must agree with the gender of the nouns they refer to.

In this respect,

a. There are some adjectives which can be used to refer to only masculine nouns and

b. There are those which can be used to refer to only feminine nouns.

c. Then there are some adjectives which can refer to either gender.

For example;

“rico” means rich and it can only refer to masculine nouns.

• él es rico (he is rich)

but      

• ella es rica (she is rich)

Because “rica” can only refer to feminine nouns.

Let us take an example from the third group

“inteligente” is intelligent and it can refer to feminine and masculine nouns. So that you can say

• él es inteligente (he is intelligent)
• ella es inteligente (she is intelligent)

Hence the ending of the adjective does not need to change.

2. All adjectives, whether they are used to refer to masculine and/or feminine nouns, have to agree with the number of the noun they refer to.

For example the adjectives above must be used as follows if they refer to plural nouns:

• Ellos son ricos
• Ellas son ricas
• Ellos son inteligentes
• Ellas son intelligentes

Go through lesson Nouns and gender in Spanish (1) to review the rules to form plurals in Spanish. Same principles apply for the formation of the plurals of adjectives.

3. Descriptive adjectives come after the noun, not before. For example;

• casa blanca (white house)

Note also that the adjectives are used with definite and indefinite articles as follows

• una casa blanca (a white house)
• unas casas blancas (some white houses)
• la casa blanca (the white house)
• las casas blancas (the white houses)

In the plural form, everything (article, noun and adjective) is used as plurals.

Let us deal with the different groups of Spanish adjectives in more detail.

“–o/a” adjectives

Do you remember the discussion on the gender rules of Spanish nouns? There, you learnt that there are many masculine nouns ending in “–o” that has feminine equivalents ending in “–a”. The same rule holds for the adjectives.

In short,

If an adjective ends in –o for the masculine form, it ends in –a for the feminine equivalent. These kinds of adjectives can be made plural by attaching –os and –as respectively.

There are so many “–o/-a” type adjectives in Spanish. Below is a list of some commonly used ones.

Vocabulary

Essential Spanish adjectives ending in –o/a

Many adjectives which are used to describe people are also of “-o/a” type. You will learn them in the next lesson.

Adjectives ending in –e

These adjectives can be either gender. Some examples are

amable (friendly), caliente (hot), dulce (sweet), grande (big)

Adjectives of nationality

Let us take an adjective describing a nationality, for example mexicano/-a. In English, when you refer to people who come from Mexico, it does not matter whether they are females or males. You will for example, say “he is Mexican” or “she is Mexican”. Because the adjective should agree with the gender in Spanish, you have to say

(él) es mexicano (he is Mexican)

(ella) es mexicana (she is Mexican)

If you would like to say they are Mexicans, you need to form the plural of the adjective so that

(ellos) son mexicanos

(ellas) son mexicanas

As other descriptive adjectives, there are many nationality adjectives ending in –o/a. In the vocabulary section below, you may find a list of them.

Some adjectives of nationality ends in“consonants” in the masculine and it ends in “-a” in the feminine equivalent. For example

• ingles (masculine); inglesa (feminine) English
• francés (masculine);    francesa(feminine) French

The adjectives of nationalities that end in “–ense”,”-a”,” í” can be either gender. For example;

• estadounidense used for example both for male and female Americans.

More examples are given below.

Vocabulary

Learn how to call nationalities and countries in Spanish

Adjectives of nationality which end in –“o/a”:

Adjectives of nationality which end in consonants:

Adjectives of nationality which end in “-ense”, “-a”, “í”.

Languages in Spanish:

The majority of the names of the languages is the same as the nationality adjective for masculine.