List of Descriptive Words: Adjectives, Adverbs, & Participles

Descriptive words help paint a picture in the reader's mind. They can be adjectives, adverbs, or participles that describe the subjects or actions of your sentence.

Using descriptive words can bring characters to life in a novel or short story, sell an item in a product advertisement, convince an audience in a persuasive writing piece, explain the setting of a news story, or provide instructions for a DIY project. Using illustrative descriptors makes your writing impossible to put down because your sentences are more vivid.

For example, the sentence "It was windy," might give the reader information, but it's not very descriptive. Instead, you could use descriptive words like:

gusty
torrential
breezy
windswept

Adjectives are descriptive words that modify nouns. They’re what you need to tell the difference between an acrobatic cat, a delirious cat, and a precious cat (or maybe a cat that’s all three).

acrobatic	adorable	adventurous
bitter	boundless	bright
brilliant	brittle	delirious
diminutive	exultant	filthy
foolhardy	gregarious	intrepid
jocular	joyful	jubilant
keen	kooky	lanky
lazy	limp	lush
luxurious	macabre	magnanimous
mellow	miserable	nimble
nocturnal	opulent	ornate
ordinary	palatial	parsimonious
peevish	picturesque	potent
practical	precious	putrid
questionable	quirky	radiant
raspy	rustic	scornful
scrumptious	silky	sly
spider-like	spectacular	tentacular
tense	thorny	verdant
whimsical	woeful	zesty

Use an adverb to describe an action rather than a noun, or if you want to add even more detail to an adjective. Most adverbs end in -ly (though not all of them), and they’re helpful ways to strengthen your writing.

amusingly	angrily	apathetically
assertively	begrudgingly	blissfully
blithely	boldly	boisterously
chillingly	coyly	darkly
dazzlingly	deafeningly	dutifully
eagerly	facetiously	faintly
falteringly	frivolously	greedily
grimly	gloweringly	guiltily
hastily	hungrily	intelligently
kindly	lavishly	lazily
listlessly	masterfully	meagerly
methodically	naively	narrowly
neglectfully	nerve-wrackingly	numbly
offensively	passionately	pleasantly
pointlessly	quickly	rapidly
rashly	secretly	seriously
swiftly	tactfully	teasingly
tenderly	timorously	tragically
underhandedly	vacantly	vividly
weirdly	youthfully	zealously

You can even use verbs as describing words — although they’re called participles in that context. Past participles end in -ed or -en, present participles end in -ing, and they all look like descriptive words that you probably use all the time.

acclaimed	accomplished	amazing
amused	baby-faced	battered
beaten	bleeding	boring
broken	blushing	bow-legged
captivating	cluttered	confusing
chosen	complicated	condemned
crystallized	customized	dazzling
depressed	disgusting	distressing
disturbing	dreaming	driven
dyed	embarrassing	exciting
far-reaching	fascinated	freckled
frustrating	hard-hearted	humiliating
interesting	irritating	lying
melted	mouthwatering	peaked
puzzling	relaxing	riveting
satisfied	scared	scented
shocking	sickening	side-splitting
staggering	sweeping	tattered
threatening	thrilled	tired
towering	weathered	wrinkled

When it comes to using descriptive words, variety is key. Go beyond the list of adjectives, adverbs, and participles above to help you set the scene with just the right imagery.

Appeal to your readers' senses with a list of strong sensory words.
Use descriptive words for scents to describe pleasant (or unpleasant) smells.
Describe an aquatic scene with water words for descriptive writing.
Learn to describe a person’s (or character’s) physical appearance.
Choose the right descriptive words to describe someone’s personality.
Paint a delicious picture with descriptive language for food.

List of Descriptive Words: Adjectives, Adverbs, & Participles

Adjectives as Descriptive Words

Adverbs as Descriptive Words

Participles as Descriptive Words

Describing Our World With Words