1
Adding -ly is a rule with about a fifth missing
Run it on the list and it is right on 98 of 126, which is 77.8%. The 28 it gets wrong are not spread about at random. Twelve end in -le, eight in -ic, seven in -y, and one is tall.
Lesson · Small Words and Comparisons · Making an adverb
Happily, Simply, Truly: Making an Adverb
The usual rule is to add -ly. On the 126 adjectives in this lab that have an -ly adverb, that is right 98 times. The 28 words it gets wrong end in three ways, and five spelling changes turn all 126 right. Another 27 adjectives have no -ly adverb the dictionary knows, and they are worth learning as a short list.
add ly 98 of 126 77.8%
add ly with changes 126 of 126 100.0%
angry angrily
capable capably
dramatic dramatically
27 of 153 have no ly adverb
The same 126 adjectives, two rules
Core ideas
What this lesson establishes
Three ideas. The last is about words the rule cannot touch.
2
Each ending has its own change
-y becomes -ily, -le becomes -ly, -ic becomes -ically, -ue becomes -uly, and -ll becomes -lly. With these the rule is right on all 126. Two of the five are hardly tested: no word in the list ends in -ue, and the only one that ends in -ll is tall.
3
Some adjectives have no -ly adverb
27 of the 153 have none in the dictionary. Some end in -ly already, some are about a person's state, some name a place or a kind of thing, and two are not adjectives at all. The list is short enough to read in a minute.
The material
The 28 words that adding -ly gets wrong
Switch the rule from the plain one to the one with changes, and the table of misses is empty. Switch back, and read it.
An adjective says what a thing is like. An adverb says how, when or how much, and many adverbs are made from an adjective by adding -ly: careful, carefully. That is the rule you were given. This lesson scores it.
The list is every word in the 2,800 that a list of parts of speech tags as an adjective and nothing else, 153 in all; the list is not perfect, and its two mistakes are named below. A dictionary was asked for the -ly spellings of each. For 126 of them there is at least one. For the other 27 there is none.
Adding -ly
Add -ly to the 126 and compare with the dictionary. 98 come out right, which is 77.8%. The 28 that come out wrong are not odd words. Terrible, comfortable, necessary, economic: they are ordinary words, and the rule makes terriblely and economicly out of them.
Five changes
The failures group by ending, and each ending has a change. A word that ends in -y after a consonant turns the y into i: angry becomes angrily. A word ending in -le changes it to -ly: capable becomes capably. A word ending in -ic takes -ally: dramatic becomes dramatically. A word ending in -ue loses the e: true becomes truly. A word ending in -ll loses one l: full becomes fully.
With the five changes the rule is right on 126 of 126, which is 100.0%. That is an honest 100% with three limits. No word in the list ends in -ue, so that change is never tested. The only -ll word is tall, which the check passes because tally is a word. And unlike is in the list, and its spelling with -ly, unlikely, is a word too, but an adjective.
Adjectives with no -ly adverb
27 of the 153 have no -ly adverb in the dictionary. Three already end in -ly: elderly, ugly and unlikely. Six are about the state of a person or a thing: afraid, alive, aware, pregnant, sorry and unable. Eleven name a place or a kind: eastern, northern, southern, rural, solar, nuclear, literary, corporate, agricultural, institutional and everyday. Five that remain are available, difficult, foreign, numerous and unclear. The last two, through and toward, are not adjectives in any ordinary use: the list of parts of speech that picked the 153 tags them so, and they are set aside here by name.
When you want an adverb for one of these, you do not make one. You say it with other words: not an adverb of difficult but with difficulty, and not an adverb of foreign but in a foreign way.
What the check cannot see
The dictionary confirms that hardly, lately and highly are words. It cannot say that none of them means what hard, late or high means when used as an adverb. Fast and hard are adverbs with no ending at all. Those are named here and not counted.
Interactive
The -ly rule, scored on every adjective in the list
Each word's form is made by the rule on the page and checked against a dictionary
the rule—
the rule is right—
share—
it misses—
the words it misses—
adjectives with no -ly adverb—
of the adjectives—
Method
Making the adverb from an adjective in front of you
Look at the ending first.
1
Does the adjective already end in -ly?
Then stop. Elderly, ugly and unlikely are adjectives and have no adverb of this kind.
2
Does it end in -y?
Change the y to i and add -ly: angry becomes angrily.
3
Does it end in a consonant and -le?
Change the -le to -ly: capable becomes capably.
4
Does it end in -ic?
Add -ally: dramatic becomes dramatically. Public is the one that takes plain -ly.
5
Otherwise add -ly
Careful becomes carefully. A word ending -ue loses the e (true, truly), and a word ending -ll loses one l (full, fully).
Check yourself
Score 0 / 0Choose the answer you can justify.
Five adjectives from the list, five ways
Each line is a row of the lab's table: the adjective, the change, and the adverb.
angry y becomes ily angrily
capable le becomes ly capably
dramatic ic becomes ically dramatically
guilty y becomes ily guiltily
careful add ly carefully
Each of the first four is a miss for plain -ly: angryly, capablely, dramaticly and guiltyly are spellings nobody writes. Sorted by ending, the 28 misses are -le 12 (acceptable, comfortable, horrible, terrible and eight more), -ic 8 (democratic, economic, historic, scientific and four more), -y 7 (angry, crazy, lazy, necessary and three more) and tall.
Tall deserves a warning. The dictionary has tally, which is what the -ll change makes, and so the lab counts tall as right. Tally is a different word and no one says tally for tall. The check shows that a spelling is a word, not that it is this word. Unlike is the same case: adding -ly makes unlikely, which is a word, and is an adjective and not the adverb of unlike.
Common mistakes
1
Adding -ly and thinking you are doneAngryly, capablely and dramaticly are what adding -ly alone makes, and it makes 28 such spellings in this list. The ending of the adjective tells you the change. Public is the one word that ends in -ic and does not take -ally: the adverb is publicly. It is not in the printed list, so the lab does not count it.
2
Thinking every word that ends in -ly is an adverbElderly, ugly and unlikely are in the list of adjectives with no -ly adverb. Friendly is an adjective too. The ending alone does not tell you the part of speech.
3
Trusting a dictionary check to tell you the meaningA check that finds hardly in the dictionary shows that the word exists. It does not show that hardly is the adverb of hard. It is not: hardly means almost not. The same holds for lately and highly.
Check your understanding
✓
Finish when you can make the -ly adverb from an adjective and say when there is none.
You should be able to apply the five spelling changes, read the rule's score against a dictionary, sort the words that adding -ly alone gets wrong by their endings, and name adjectives that have no -ly adverb.
Note: The lab reads spellings and not meanings. The dictionary confirms that hardly, lately and highly are words. It cannot say that they do not mean hard, late and high, and the adverbs that look just like the adjective (fast, hard) are named here and not counted. Happy, simple, basic, true and full are not in the list either, because the word list also files them under another part of speech; the rules above are the same for them.