Adjectives: the declension

Here you can find all the important information about adjective declension in the German language

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What is 'declension of adjectives'?

The declension of adjectives - what does it mean?

When adjectives come before a noun, they must agree with that noun. That's how you know they belong together. Therefore they have an ending that matches the noun .

Adjektive - Endung von Adjektiv und Nomen

To make sure that the ending agrees with the noun, it is declined : it changes depending on

Case (nominative, accusative, dative, genitive)
Gender (masculine, feminine, neuter) and
Number (singular or plural)

Example:

Der schöne Pulli ist nicht teuer!
Ich kaufe den schönen Pulli.

Reminder:

Adjectives describe how something is:

cold, warm, high, low, new, old ….

Which ending?

How do I know which ending the adjective gets?

1. There is a definite article

The definite article shows the gender, case and number of the noun in the German language.

The form of the definite article (der, die, das, den, dem) is then the signal for the noun group.

If there is no definite article, there may either be

an indefinite article (ein, eine, einen, einem, eines, einer) or
no article = the "zero-article".

As there is no article with a signal, the signal must be on the adjective.

For example: "ein Tag"

"ein" can be masculin or neutral. We don't have a signal.

So: The signal is either at the article or at the adjective

2. There is no definite article

Adjektive und ihre Endungen im Deutschen

That means:

The declension of adjectives follows 3 different types:

Adjective declension after definite article

If there is a definite article before the adjective, it clearly determines the case, gender and number.

The adjective ends with:

almost always an -en
in five cases only an -e

You can see what these are in the following table:

Deklination Tabelle: Adjektive bestimmter Artikel

Here you can find the signal on the article .

After some words the adjective gets the ending like after the definite article:

Adjectives after words like: dieser, welcher, derjenige, derselbe, jeder, jener, solcher

have the same pattern of declension.

Example:

Welcher kleine Junge hat gerufen? - Das war kein Junge, das war dieses kleine Mädchen!

Wir gehen an jedem sonnigen Tag spazieren.

After definite article

Words with ending like after definite article

Adjective declension after indefinite article

The indefinite article has no signal that definitely determines the case, gender and number of the noun.
That's why the signal is on the adjective.

Endung Adjektive nach unbestimmtem Artikel

Where the ending -e appeared five times in the table above, the adjective gets the ending of the definite article.

The other endings are -en again.

So: The adjective gets as an ending

almost always an -en
in five cases the ending of the definite article, ie -e
the indefinite article has no plural form - the ending works like the 'zero article'