Forming adverbs from adjectives (-o, -e)

Turning Adjectives into Adverbs

In Polish, while adjectives describe nouns (a careful student), adverbs describe verbs, telling us how an action is performed (listening carefully).

To form an adverb, we take the adjective stem (usually by dropping the final -y or -i) and add either -o or -e.

Adverbs Ending in "-nie"

For most adjectives ending in -ny, you will form the adverb by changing the ending to -nie. Notice how the sentence below uses the adjective uważny (careful) to describe the student, and the adverb uważnie (carefully) to describe how he listens.

You can apply this exact same pattern to other common adjectives like wyraźny (clear) and poważny (serious).

Adverbs Ending in "-o"

Many other adjectives, especially those whose stems end in consonants like -w- or -ł-, form their adverbs by dropping the -y and adding -o.

For example, łatwy (easy) becomes łatwo (easily).

Adverbs ending in -o are also frequently used without a specific subject to describe the general atmosphere or state of a place. For example, miły (nice) becomes miło.

And just like the -nie adverbs, they describe the manner in which someone does something. Wesoły (cheerful) becomes wesoło (cheerfully).

More Practice with Adverbs

Let's look at a few more adverbs ending in -nie derived from -ny adjectives. Notice how they perfectly describe the verbs jeździć (to drive) and śpiewać (to sing).

Finally, adverbs are sometimes used as intensifiers before adjectives, much like in English. For instance, strasznie (terribly) can be used to mean "very" or "awfully."