Quite,
pretty, rather, fairly.
You can use
quite/rather/pretty/fairly +adjectives or adverbs .
Examples:
It’s quite
cold.
It’s rather
cold.
It’s pretty
cold.
It’s fairly
cold.
Quite and
pretty are very similar in the meaning:
Examples:
You’ll need
a coat when you got out. It’s quite cold / quite pretty cold (=less than ‘very
cold’, but more than ‘a little’)
I’m
surprised you haven’t heard of her. She’s pretty famous /quite famous.
Emmanuel
lives near me, so we always see each other pretty often.
Pretty is
more used mainly in spoken English.
Quite goes
before a/an:
We live in
quite an old house
I have quite
a beautiful voice.
Amisi lives
in quite a cool tiny house.
My friend
has quite a good job
Compare:
I have quite
a good job.
I have a
pretty good job.
She has
quite a good voice.
She has a
pretty good voice.
You can use
quite (not pretty) in the following ways:
Quite a/an =
noun (without an adjective):
I didn't expect to see them. It was quite a
surprise.
I don’t know
what I could have done without their help. Their support was quite a gift.
You can also
say quite a lot (of…):
There were
quite a lot of people at the party.
They have
quite a lot of cars.
There were
quite a lot of children playing outside.
Life is not
meant to have quite a lot of unpleasant moments.
Quite + verb
is possible too, especially with like and enjoy:
I quite like
straight people.
I quite
enjoy viewing advertisements online.
I quite love
magazines.
I quite hate
introspective guys.
Rather is
similar to quiet and pretty. We often use it for negative ideas”
The weather
is not so good. It’s rather cloudy.
He’s rather
shy. He does not talk very much.
When rather
for positive ideas (good, nice etc.), it means ‘unusually or surprisingly’:
Bambale is
rather doing better these days. Who is he hanging around with?
These
oranges are rather good. Where did you get them?
This man
rather has empathy with broke people. What a decent human he is!
We are
rather receiving big ads.
Fairly is
weaker than quite/rather/pretty. For example, if something is fairly good, it
is not very good and it could be better.
His room is
fairly big, but I’d prefer a bigger one.
We see each
other fairly often, but not as often as we used to.
Quite also
means ‘completely’ with a number of adjectives, especially the ones in the
table:
‘Are you
sure’ ‘Yes, quite sure.’
|
Sure
right clear different incredible amazing certain wrong safe obvious
unnecessary extraordinary impossible
|
