Turkish Adjectives: Position, Word Order, 'Bir' and Using Adjectives as Nouns

Adjectives (sıfatlar) are one of the friendliest parts of Turkish. They sit before the noun, they never change form to agree with it, and almost any adjective can also work as a noun or an adverb without extra suffixes. What you do need to learn is word order: where bir goes, how to stack several adjectives, and how a predicate adjective differs from an attributive one.

Adjectives come before the noun

• büyük ev (a big house / the big house)
• sıcak çay (hot tea)
• yeni telefon (a new phone)
• zor soru (a difficult question)

Adjectives never change

The noun takes the plural, possessive and case endings. The adjective stays exactly as it is.

There is no gender to worry about either: güzel kadın (beautiful woman), güzel adam (handsome man), güzel şehir (beautiful city).

Attributive vs predicate: phrase or sentence?

The position of the adjective tells you whether you have a phrase or a full sentence.

In the sentence version, the adjective can take the “to be” endings from personal pronouns and the verb “to be”: Yorgunum (I’m tired), Hazır mısın? (Are you ready?), Çok mutluyuz (We’re very happy). A plural subject does not make the adjective plural: Evler büyük (The houses are big).

Where bir goes

To say “a [adjective] [noun]”, put bir between the adjective and the noun:

• güzel bir gün (a nice day)
• büyük bir sorun (a big problem)
• ucuz bir otel (a cheap hotel)

Bir güzel gün is not wrong, but it either stresses “one” or sounds folksy. For the everyday indefinite article, use adjective + bir + noun.

Stacking several words before a noun

When a noun has several modifiers, the usual order is:

demonstrative → number → adjective(s) → noun

• bu iki eski ev (these two old houses)
• şu üç küçük kedi (those three little cats)
• o güzel mavi elbise (that beautiful blue dress)

With bir, a degree word goes before the adjective: çok güzel bir ev (a very beautiful house). After a number, the noun stays singular: üç büyük ev, not üç büyük evler. See the Turkish numbers guide.

Common adjectives in pairs

Colours work the same way: kırmızı araba (red car), mavi gözler (blue eyes), beyaz peynir (white cheese). The colours vocabulary post lists them all.

Making adjectives stronger or weaker

Put a degree word before the adjective:

• çok güzel (very beautiful)
• biraz pahalı (a bit expensive)
• oldukça zor (quite difficult)
• pek iyi değil (not very good; pek is used with a negative)
• fazla tatlı (too sweet)

Turkish also has a special intensifying prefix for some common adjectives. It repeats the first syllable, closes it with m, p, r or s, and adds the whole word. These are fixed forms to learn as vocabulary:

Adjectives as nouns

An adjective can stand alone and act as a noun, taking any noun ending. English often needs “one” or “people” here.

• Büyüğü alayım. (I’ll take the big one.) Note büyük → büyüğü (k softens to ğ).
• Kırmızıyı mı, maviyi mi istiyorsun? (Do you want the red one or the blue one?)
• Gençler geç yatar. (Young people go to bed late.)
• Yaşlılara yer verin. (Give your seat to the elderly.)

Adjectives as adverbs

Many adjectives describe actions without any change:

• Güzel konuşuyorsun. (You speak well.)
• Hızlı yürüyor. (She walks fast.)
• Daha yavaş konuşur musunuz? (Could you speak more slowly?)

That last sentence is worth memorising. The comparative page explains daha, and the adverbs guide covers other ways to form adverbs.

Asking about qualities

• Nasıl bir ev arıyorsunuz? (What kind of house are you looking for?)
• Ne renk? (What colour?)
• Ne güzel! (How lovely!)

Describing people

• Kardeşim uzun boylu ve sarışın. (My sister is tall and blonde.)
• Çok çalışkan bir öğrenci. (She’s a very hard-working student.)

Shades and degrees with suffixes

Turkish can also soften an adjective with a suffix. Two are common:

• -(I)msI “-ish”: yeşilimsi (greenish), mavimsi (bluish), tatlımsı (sweetish)
• -CA “rather, fairly”: uzunca (fairly long), büyükçe (biggish)

Many adjectives are themselves built from nouns with -lı and -sız: tuzlu (salty), şekersiz (sugar-free). These are covered in adjective suffixes -lı, -sız, -cı, -lık.

Adjectives in a real conversation

A flat viewing with an estate agent (emlakçı):

Emlakçı: Nasıl bir ev arıyorsunuz? (What kind of home are you looking for?)

Anna: Küçük ama aydınlık bir daire arıyorum. (I’m looking for a small but bright flat.)

Emlakçı: Bu daire nasıl? Bina yepyeni. (How about this flat? The building is brand new.)

Anna: Mutfak biraz küçük, ama salon çok güzel. Kira pahalı mı? (The kitchen is a bit small, but the living room is lovely. Is the rent expensive?)

Emlakçı: Hayır, pahalı değil. Bu mahallede en uygunu bu. (No, it isn’t. This is the most affordable one in the neighbourhood.)

Notice küçük ama aydınlık bir daire (two adjectives joined by ama, then bir), the predicate adjectives küçük, güzel, pahalı, and en uygunu (an adjective used as a noun). For more flat-hunting vocabulary, see the renting guide.

Common mistakes

• Putting the adjective after the noun in a phrase. ev büyük is a sentence (“the house is big”), not “a big house”.
• Making the adjective plural. güzeller evler → güzel evler.
• Using yaşlı for things. yaşlı araba → eski araba.
• Wrong bir position. bir güzel ev → güzel bir ev for “a beautiful house”.
• Plural after a number. iki yeni arkadaşlar → iki yeni arkadaş.

Mini-exercise

Translate into Turkish.

1. a cheap hotel
2. The tea is cold.
3. these three new books
4. I’m tired.
5. I’ll take the small one.
6. a very good idea (idea = fikir)
7. an old man

Answers: 1. ucuz bir otel · 2. Çay soğuk. · 3. bu üç yeni kitap · 4. Yorgunum. · 5. Küçüğü alayım. · 6. çok iyi bir fikir · 7. yaşlı bir adam

Next steps

Learn to compare with daha and en on the comparative and superlative page, then build your own adjectives from nouns with -lı, -sız, -cı and -lık.