What are the types of adjectives in French?

Descriptive adjectives such as grand and intéressant, and then the determinative ones: possessive (mon, ta), demonstrative (ce, cette), interrogative and exclamative (quel), indefinite (chaque, plusieurs), and numeral (deux, deuxième). Participles used as describing words, such as fatigué or amusant, form a further group.

What's the difference between a descriptive adjective and a determiner?

A descriptive adjective names a quality you could disagree about, and it accepts très: une maison très ancienne. A determiner identifies or counts and cannot be intensified: cette maison is either this house or it isn't. Determiners also occupy the article slot, so ce and le never appear together.

Do all French adjectives agree with the noun?

Nearly all of them. The exceptions are cardinal numbers apart from un, compound colours such as bleu clair, colours borrowed from objects such as orange and marron, and adjectives used as adverbs, as in elles travaillent dur.

Is quel an adjective in French?

Yes, and it is one of the clearest cases, because it agrees: quel train, quelle heure, quels livres, quelles idées. It is interrogative in a question and exclamative in an exclamation, and in an exclamation French drops the article that English requires: quelle surprise, what a surprise.

Can a past participle be used as an adjective?

Yes. Ouvert, fatigué, cassé, and écrit all describe nouns and agree with them: une porte ouverte, des lettres écrites à la main. Once a participle is doing that job it takes the noun's gender and number and no longer needs an auxiliary verb.

French grammar · Beginner

Types of Adjectives in French: The Full Map, From Descriptive to Determinative

Written by Camille Laurent, Lead French Curriculum Editor · Reviewed May 2026

French adjectives come in two families. Descriptive adjectives name a quality — grand, rouge, fatigué — and can be intensified with très. Determinative adjectives, which include the possessives, demonstratives, interrogatives, indefinites, and numbers, identify or count the noun instead and take the place of the article.

Chaque étudiant a rendu son premier devoir écrit.

Every student handed in their first written assignment.

What it is

Anything that attaches to a noun and changes shape to match it counts as an adjective in French, which makes the category much wider than the English word suggests. Mon, ce, quel, chaque, and deuxième are all adjectives in French grammar, alongside the ordinary describing words. Sorting them into families explains why some sit in front of the noun and others behind, and why only some can take très.

Ces trois vieilles photos italiennes sont mes préférées. — These three old Italian photos are my favourites.

How to spot it

Ask what the word contributes. If it names a quality you could argue about, it is descriptive. If it tells you which one, whose, how many, or which one you mean, it is determinative.

une soirée agréable — a pleasant evening (descriptive)
cette soirée — this evening (demonstrative)
notre soirée — our evening (possessive)
quelle soirée — what an evening (exclamative)

A noun can take one determinative adjective and several descriptive ones at the same time: ces deux belles vieilles maisons blanches.

Adjective Types Quick Reference

The families of French adjectives

Type	What it contributes	Examples
Descriptive	a quality	grand, rouge, intéressant, français
Possessive	whose it is	mon, ta, ses, notre, leurs
Demonstrative	which one, pointed at	ce, cet, cette, ces
Interrogative	which one, asked about	quel, quelle, quels, quelles
Exclamative	a reaction to it	Quel courage ! — What courage!
Indefinite	a vague quantity or identity	chaque, plusieurs, quelques, certains
Numeral	how many or in what order	deux, vingt, deuxième, dernier
Verbal	a participle doing an adjective's job	fatigué, ouvert, amusant, surprenant

Common Adjective Types Examples in French

Each family in an ordinary sentence:

Descriptive Adjectives

C'était un film ennuyeux.: It was a boring film.
Elle porte une robe verte.: She's wearing a green dress.
Ce sont des idées originales.: Those are original ideas.
Ils habitent dans un vieil immeuble.: They live in an old building.

These are the only adjectives you can put très in front of, and the only ones you can compare with plus or moins.

Determiners Doing Adjective Work

Mon frère aîné habite à Nantes.: My older brother lives in Nantes.
Cette semaine passe vite.: This week is going fast.
Quelle heure est-il ?: What time is it?
Chaque matin, il court une heure.: Every morning he runs for an hour.

None of these can share the noun with an article. Le mon frère and la cette semaine are impossible.

Counting and Ranking

J'ai lu les deux premières pages.: I read the first two pages.
Nous sommes au vingt et unième siècle.: We're in the twenty-first century.
Ça coûte quatre-vingts euros.: That costs eighty euros.
Quelques amis sont venus.: A few friends came.

Cardinal numbers do not agree, with the exception of un, which becomes une. Ordinals do: les premières pages, les derniers jours.

Participles as Adjectives

La fenêtre est restée ouverte.: The window stayed open.
Les enfants avaient l'air fatigués.: The children looked tired.
C'est une histoire amusante.: It's an amusing story.
Il range le linge repassé.: He's putting away the ironed laundry.

Once a participle is used to describe a noun, it agrees like any other adjective and stops behaving like a verb.

How the Adjective Families Behave

The split between describing and determining explains almost every difference in how these words are used.

Everything Agrees With the Noun

Whichever family it belongs to, a French adjective takes the gender and number of the noun it belongs to. That is the property that makes possessives and demonstratives adjectives in the first place: ce becomes cette, mon becomes ma, quel becomes quelles.

Quelles belles journées nous avons eues !

What beautiful days we've had!

Match the noun, always.

Determinatives Replace the Article

A noun takes exactly one determiner. A possessive, a demonstrative, an interrogative, or an indefinite occupies that slot, which is why the article disappears when one of them turns up.

Ce livre est à moi ; c'est mon livre préféré.

This book is mine; it's my favourite book.

One determiner per noun.

Descriptives Usually Follow, Determinatives Always Precede

A determinative adjective opens the noun phrase without exception. Descriptive adjectives normally come after the noun, apart from a short list covering beauty, age, goodness, and size — beau, joli, jeune, vieux, bon, mauvais, grand, petit — which sit in front.

Ces deux petites villes portugaises sont charmantes.

These two small Portuguese towns are charming.

Determiner, number, short adjective, noun, long adjective.

Only Descriptives Can Be Intensified

Très, assez, trop, plus, and moins all measure a quality, so they only work with descriptive adjectives. There is no degree of my, this, or each to measure, which is why très mon and assez cette are not merely unusual but impossible.

C'est un problème très grave et assez urgent.

It's a very serious and rather urgent problem.

très + quality only.

Nationality Adjectives Stay Lowercase

French capitalises the noun that names a person from a country but not the adjective describing something as belonging to it. Un Espagnol is a person; espagnol as a describing word, and the name of the language, keeps its small letter.

Un journaliste belge a interviewé une Belge à Bruxelles.

A Belgian journalist interviewed a Belgian woman in Brussels.

Adjective small, person capital.

Common Mistakes with Adjective Types

Incorrect: C'est le mon livre. — It's my book.

Correct: C'est mon livre. — It's my book.

A possessive adjective is itself the determiner, so the article has nowhere to go. The same applies to demonstratives: la cette maison is impossible for the same reason.

Incorrect: Il a un léger accent Français. — He has a slight French accent.

Correct: Il a un léger accent français. — He has a slight French accent.

English capitalises nationality words in every use. French only capitalises the noun naming a person: un Français a un accent français.

Incorrect: Elle a les yeux bleus clairs. — She has light blue eyes.

Correct: Elle a les yeux bleu clair. — She has light blue eyes.

A colour adjective qualified by a second word becomes a compound and freezes: bleu clair, vert foncé, bleu marine. Neither half agrees any more.

Incorrect: J'ai acheté une maison grande. — I bought a big house.

Correct: J'ai acheté une grande maison. — I bought a big house.

Descriptive adjectives follow the noun by default, but the short group covering size, age, beauty, and goodness goes in front. Grand is in that group, so putting it after sounds foreign rather than simply unusual.

Adjectives That Step Outside Their Category

Three habits let a French adjective do a job you would expect a different part of speech to handle.

Quel: one word, three jobs

Quel asks which in a question, expresses a reaction in an exclamation, and combines with que plus the subjunctive to mean whatever. All three agree with the noun in the usual way.

Quel train prends-tu ?: Which train are you taking?
Quelle chance !: What luck!
Quelle que soit ta décision, je te soutiendrai.: Whatever your decision is, I'll support you.
Quels sont vos horaires ?: What are your opening hours?

In an exclamation French uses no article: quel dommage, never un quel dommage, where English inserts a.

Descriptive adjectives turned into nouns

Put an article in front of a descriptive adjective and it becomes a noun. The gender and number then say who is being talked about.

Les jeunes sortent le samedi soir.: Young people go out on Saturday nights.
Le plus important, c'est la santé.: The most important thing is health.
Il aide les plus démunis.: He helps the most deprived.
Prends la petite, elle est plus légère.: Take the small one, it's lighter.

The masculine singular of this construction often means the abstract idea: le beau, le vrai, le nouveau.

Adjectives frozen into adverbs

A small set of adjectives is used after certain verbs to describe the action rather than a noun. In that position they are adverbs, so they stop agreeing entirely.

Ces fleurs sentent bon.: These flowers smell good.
Elles travaillent dur.: They work hard.
Les billets coûtent cher.: The tickets are expensive.
Parlez plus fort, s'il vous plaît.: Speak louder, please.

Ces fleurs sentent bonnes would mean the flowers are doing the smelling and are good at it, which is not what anyone means.

Adjective Types FAQs

What are the types of adjectives in French?: Descriptive adjectives such as grand and intéressant, and then the determinative ones: possessive (mon, ta), demonstrative (ce, cette), interrogative and exclamative (quel), indefinite (chaque, plusieurs), and numeral (deux, deuxième). Participles used as describing words, such as fatigué or amusant, form a further group.
What's the difference between a descriptive adjective and a determiner?: A descriptive adjective names a quality you could disagree about, and it accepts très: une maison très ancienne. A determiner identifies or counts and cannot be intensified: cette maison is either this house or it isn't. Determiners also occupy the article slot, so ce and le never appear together.
Do all French adjectives agree with the noun?: Nearly all of them. The exceptions are cardinal numbers apart from un, compound colours such as bleu clair, colours borrowed from objects such as orange and marron, and adjectives used as adverbs, as in elles travaillent dur.
Is quel an adjective in French?: Yes, and it is one of the clearest cases, because it agrees: quel train, quelle heure, quels livres, quelles idées. It is interrogative in a question and exclamative in an exclamation, and in an exclamation French drops the article that English requires: quelle surprise, what a surprise.
Can a past participle be used as an adjective?: Yes. Ouvert, fatigué, cassé, and écrit all describe nouns and agree with them: une porte ouverte, des lettres écrites à la main. Once a participle is doing that job it takes the noun's gender and number and no longer needs an auxiliary verb.