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French grammar - Adjectives and gender - masculine and feminine

Adjectives and gender - masculine and feminine

Adjectives are words that describe a noun. For example 'big' and 'strong'.

In French adjectives should agree with the noun in both gender and number.

This means that an adjective may change depending on whether the noun it is describing is masculine or feminine, and singular or plural.

In general singular masculine adjectives end with a consonant.

And the general rule is to get the singular feminine form we append an -e to the masculine form of the adjective.

Note however that there are lots of exceptions to this rule. We will cover these exceptions in the next couple of topics.

Examples:
Il est grand.
He is big.

grand (adj) means 'big'

Elle est grande aussi.
She is big also.

grand (adj.m) ⇒ grande (adj.f)

aussi (adj) means 'also' (also used as a comparative)

Marc est fort.
Marc is strong.

fort (adj) means 'strong''

Camille est forte.
Camille is strong.

fort (adj.m) ⇒ forte (adj.f)

Jacques est-il français ?
Jacques, is he French?

français (adj) means 'French''

Juliette est-elle vraiment française ?
Juliette, is she really French?

français (adj.m) ⇒ française (adj.f)

Es-tu prêt ?
Are you (familiar) (male) ready?

prêt (adj) means 'ready''

Elle n'est pas encore prête.
She is not yet ready.

prêt (adj.m) ⇒ prête (adj.f)

Le café est noir.
The coffee is black.

noir (adj & noun.m) means 'black''

La voiture n'est pas noire.
The car is not black.

noir (adj.m) ⇒ noire (adj.f)

Je ne suis pas encore fatigué.
I (male) am not tired yet.

fatigué (adj) means 'tired''

Pourquoi es-tu déjà fatiguée ?
Why are you (familiar) (female) already tired?

fatigué (adj.m) ⇒ fatiguée (adj.f)

La maison est assez petite.
The house is quite small.

petit (adj) means 'small'

petit (adj.m) ⇒ petite (adj.f)

La piscine est vraiment froide.
The pool is really cold.

froid (adj) means 'cold'

froid (adj.m) ⇒ froide (adj.f)

Le lait est froid et l'eau est froide.
The milk is cold and the water is cold.

eau (f) means 'water'

lait (m) means 'milk''

froid (adj.m) ⇒ froide (adj.f)

La chambre est bien chaude.
The room is quite warm.

chaud (adj) means 'warm' or 'hot'

chaud (adj.m) ⇒ chaude (adj.f)

bien (adv) means 'quite' or 'well'

Le café est chaud et l'eau est chaude.
The coffee is hot and the water is hot.

café (m) means 'coffee' or 'café''