Meaning & use
beautiful
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Meaning
adjectivecomparable
Giving strong pleasure through appearance, sound, movement, or another pleasing quality.
Grammar: Use more beautiful and most beautiful; do not say beautifuller.
Patterns
- beautiful view
- beautiful music
- beautiful to someone
The garden is beautiful in the early morning.
She played a beautiful melody on the violin.
It was beautiful to see the neighbors help after the storm.
Word forms
| comparative | more beautiful |
|---|---|
| superlative | most beautiful |
Common combinations
- beautiful view
- The hotel room has a beautiful view of the harbor.
- beautiful voice
- The caller had a beautiful voice and spoke clearly.
- beautifully made
- The jacket is beautifully made, with straight seams.
- beautiful and simple
- The recipe is beautiful and simple: bread, tomatoes, and olive oil.
- a beautiful day
- We took a walk because it was such a beautiful day.
Synonyms and how they differ
- lovely
- Lovely is common and warm but usually softer than beautiful; it can also describe enjoyable experiences.
- pretty
- Pretty often suggests pleasing appearance in a lighter, less powerful way than beautiful.
- attractive
- Attractive means pleasing or drawing interest; it is broader and can refer to ideas, prices, or people.
- gorgeous
- Gorgeous is very strong and often informal; beautiful can sound more measured or formal.
Opposites
Word family
- beauty noun
- The quality that gives pleasure to the senses or mind.
- beautifully adverb
- In a beautiful way; also used for very well done.
- beautify verb
- To make something more beautiful.
Commonly confused: beautiful or beauty?
beautiful vs beauty
Beauty is the noun for the quality; beautiful is the adjective describing something that has it.
Practice
Choose the best sentence.
Choose one answer.
Beautiful forms its comparative and superlative with more and most. Beautifuller and more beautifuller are impossible forms, and beautifully is an adverb, not the needed adjective.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “beautiful”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.