Learn English: Verbs vs Adverbs, Know The Difference

Verbs and adverbs are two of the major parts of speech and are often used alongside each other in sentences. These two very commonly used categories of words have similar names, but they are used quite differently from each other.

Let us understand the difference between the two with the help of some examples.

What is a Verb?

A verb is a part of speech that denotes action. In a sentence, usually, a verb talks about the action the subject performs. A verb can express a physical action, a mental action, as well as a state of being.

In general, there are three major types of verbs: verbs that refer to physical actions, verbs that refer to mental actions, and verbs that refer to states of being. In brief, physical actions refer to actions that bodies or objects perform, mental actions refer to actions the brain performs, and states of being describe someone’s or something’s existence or qualities they have.

You can often recognise these words because they usually have the word ‘to’ preceding them. For example, some common English verbs include: ‘to walk’, ‘to swim’, ‘to talk’, ‘to watch’, ‘to try’, ‘to make’, ‘to read’, and ‘to examine’.

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Examples of verbs:

1. Birds fly.

2. She was happy.

3. I think the movie starts at nine.

4. The milk turned sour because he left it out overnight.

5. They ate some bread with cheese.

What is an Adverb?

An adverb is a part of speech that modifies a verb, adjective, clause, or another adverb. Like adjectives, adverbs provide more information about the words that they modify.

It is interesting to note that adverbs primarily end with the letter ‘y.’ Of course, it is a general rule. However, there are a number of adverbs in the English language that do not end with the letter ‘y.’

The adverbs that end with the letter ‘y’ are faithfully, beautifully, swiftly, carefully, and the like. Adverbs like fast, good, slow, now and the like of course do not end with the letter ‘y.’

Examples of adverbs:

1. She sadly walked away.

2. Thankfully, we got there early.

3. He was really tired yesterday.

4. Angela sings beautifully.

5. She completed the test remarkably well for a newcomer.

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