Italian/Grammar/Adjectives

Adjectives / Aggettivi

Unlike in English, adjectives may be placed both before or after the noun.

Example:

La grande città (the large town)
La città grande (the large town)
- are both correct, with slightly different meaning

As a general trend, adjectives tend to follow nouns rather than precede them.

Adjectives must agree with the noun they modify both in gender (masculine or feminine) and in number (singular or plural).

Examples:

La macchina rossa (the red car)
Le macchine rosse (the red cars)
Il divano rosso (the red sofa)
I divani rossi (the red sofas)

Endings for adjectives:

Masc.sing.  Fem.sing.   Masc.plur.  Fem.plur.
    o           a           i          e
    e           e           i          i

Adjectives that end in -e do not need to modify their endings for gender. Their endings change only depending on whether the noun is singular or plural.

Example:

Il libro verde (the green book)
La porta verde (the green door)
I libri verdi (the green books)
Le porte verdi (the green doors)

See also

• Italian/Vocabulary/Adjectives
• Italian/Grammar/Comparatives and superlatives