Adjectives of quality are words that give more information about the kind or quality of the noun or pronoun it modifies. They are often called descriptive adjectives. It may tell you the color, shape, size, or type of a noun. They help the reader understand exactly what you mean.

Simply put, they answer the question, “What kind of?”

There are lots of adjectives of quality that you can use to make your writing more descriptive. They help you to “Show, don’t tell,” which is a descriptive writing technique.

First, there are just general types of adjectives of quality that give information about the noun or pronoun. Think of your five senses. Those are the descriptive types of words that you’ll want to use to bring your writing to life. You can use adjectives of quality together to create a specific picture of what you’re describing.

Here is a list of some of the different categories of Descriptive Adjectives:

Using your five senses is the best way to use descriptive adjectives. Here is a large list of descriptive adjectives divided by sense.

There are an endless amount of descriptive adjectives that you can use, and then even combine two with a hyphen - to make an even more vibrant image of what you’re telling the reader.

Example:
• The liquid left a tangy-sweet tinge on my tongue.
• Wafting through the hallway was a slight minty-moldy odor.

If you’re looking to amp up your descriptive writing, be sure to utilize your thesaurus to explore the lexicon for synonyms and antonyms.