Comparatives vs. Superlatives

When you’re comparing items, you need to notice if you’re comparing two things or more than two things.When you compare two items, you’re using what’s called a comparative, so you use “more” before the adjective or the suffix “-er” on the end of it. You can remember that comparatives are for two thing because “comparative” has the sound “pair” in it and a pair is always two things. When you compare three or more items, you’re using a superlative, so you use “most” or the suffix “-est.” You can remember that superlatives are for more than two things because “superlative” has the word “super” in it and when you want a whole bunch of something, you supersize it.So to think about it loosely, use a comparative when you have a pair of things and a superlative when you have a supersized group (at least more than two).items.

For example, it would be incorrect to say, “It was the tallest of the two buildings.” You are comparing just two buildings, so you should use a comparative, “taller,” not a superlative, “tallest.” A tip to help you remember which suffix goes with which number of items is that “-er” has two letters, and it is for comparing two things; “-est” has three letters, and it is for comparing three or more things.Sometimes, though, an error of this kind sounds more natural than the grammatically correct version.

or for eg, You’ll hear, and probably say, “Put your best foot forward.” Of course we have only two feet, so we should really say “better foot,” but that sounds very strange. Maybe we say “best” because we are speaking figuratively, as in “Do the best you can”; we’re not really talking about actual feet. But we also say, “May the best team win,” usually when only two teams are playing.So “better” versus “best” is a bit of a conundrum. Sometimes the ungrammatical way sounds best.

. Well, I guess “best” is sometimes the best option, even if it’s not technically correct. In speech, it’s probably fine to let a few “bests” slip out, but in formal writing you might want to use a comparative when it’s called for. If it sounds unnatural, then rewrite the sentence