Comparing French Adverbs

Adverbs say how something is done - quickly, well, often - and French compares them with the same plus / moins / aussi ... que sandwich it uses for adjectives. The good news: adverbs never agree, so there is nothing to match in gender or number. The work is in a small set of irregulars, led by the bien -> mieux pair that English-speakers get wrong constantly.

The regular pattern: plus / moins / aussi + adverb + que

Put the marker before the adverb, que after. The adverb itself does not change form.

• Il court plus vite que moi. (He runs faster than me.)
• Elle parle moins fort que toi. (She speaks less loudly than you.)
• Je me lève aussi tôt que lui. (I get up as early as him.)
• Tu travailles plus sérieusement que ton frère. (You work more seriously than your brother.)

Notice there is no agreement anywhere. vite, fort, tôt stay in one form whoever the subject is, because they describe the verb, not a noun. That is the single biggest difference from comparing adjectives, where the adjective has to agree. The adjective side is on the comparatives page.

The superlative: the frozen le

To say "the fastest", "the most often", put le in front of plus or moins. The le is frozen - it never agrees, because there is no noun for it to agree with.

• C'est elle qui travaille le plus vite. (She's the one who works fastest.)
• C'est lui qui vient le moins souvent. (He's the one who comes least often.)
• C'est ce chemin qu'on prend le plus rarement. (That's the path we take least often.)
• Parle le plus clairement possible. (Speak as clearly as possible.)

Even with a feminine subject the article stays le: elle court le plus vite, never "la plus vite". This invariable le is the same one you see in le mieux, and it is a reliable signal that you are dealing with an adverb superlative rather than an adjective one.

The irregulars

Four common adverbs have irregular comparatives. They are worth learning as fixed items.

bien -> mieux -> le mieux is the one to nail. Bien is "well"; mieux is "better"; le mieux is "best". All three modify a verb.

• Elle chante mieux que moi. (She sings better than me.)
• Je vais mieux aujourd'hui. (I'm doing better today.)
• C'est lui qui cuisine le mieux. (He's the one who cooks best.)

mal is the awkward one, because it has two comparatives. The old form pis survives only in fixed expressions - tant pis (too bad / never mind) and de mal en pis (from bad to worse). For everyday "worse", French now uses plus mal.

• Il joue plus mal que la semaine dernière. (He's playing worse than last week.)
• Tant pis, on ira sans lui. (Never mind, we'll go without him.)
• La situation va de mal en pis. (The situation is going from bad to worse.)

So: produce plus mal for living, breathing comparison; recognise pis as a frozen relic in those two set phrases.

beaucoup -> plus and peu -> moins quietly underpin everything else - "more" and "less" with verbs are just the comparatives of "a lot" and "little".

• Je travaille plus que lui. (I work more than him.)
• Elle sort moins qu'avant. (She goes out less than before.)
• C'est moi qui mange le plus. (I'm the one who eats the most.)
• C'est lui qui parle le moins. (He's the one who speaks the least.)

mieux (adverb) vs meilleur (adjective): the split that matters

English has one word, "better", for two French ones. The dividing line is what the word modifies.

• mieux modifies a verb - how an action is done. Elle chante mieux (she sings better). It never agrees.
• meilleur modifies a noun - it describes a thing, and agrees with it. un meilleur chanteur (a better singer), une meilleure idée (a better idea).

The test is quick: if "better" describes how someone does something, use mieux; if it describes a noun, use meilleur. The same split runs through the superlatives - le mieux (adverb) versus le meilleur (adjective). The adjective side, with full agreement, is on the comparatives page and the superlatives page.

Worked examples

• Mon frère conduit plus prudemment que moi. (My brother drives more carefully than me.)
• Elle répond aussi vite que le professeur. (She answers as fast as the teacher.)
• C'est en forgeant qu'on devient le mieux préparé. (It's by practising that you become best prepared.)
• Je dors moins bien depuis lundi. (I've been sleeping less well since Monday.)
• Il a tout raté: ça ne pouvait pas aller plus mal. (He failed everything: it couldn't have gone worse.)
• C'est elle qui travaille le plus dur de l'équipe. (She's the one who works hardest in the team.)
• Tant pis, on recommencera demain. (Never mind, we'll start again tomorrow.)

Common mistakes English speakers make

Using meilleur where you need mieux: elle chante meilleur is wrong, it's elle chante mieux, because chante is a verb. Conversely, using mieux for a noun: une mieux idée is wrong, it's une meilleure idée. Saying plus bien for "better" - the irregular mieux already means that, so plus bien is never right. Agreeing the superlative le on an adverb: it stays le even with a feminine subject - elle court le plus vite, not "la plus vite". And reaching for pis as the everyday "worse": outside tant pis and de mal en pis, the living form is plus mal.

See also

• The comparatives page covers plus, moins, aussi + adjective and the meilleur / mieux split on the adjective side.
• The superlatives page covers le plus / le moins + adjective, le meilleur, and the repeated article.
• The adverbs of manner page covers how the -ment adverbs (and the irregular bien, mal, vite) are formed in the first place.