Gradable / Non-gradable Adjectives

Some adjectives may have more than one meaning or sense. It's possible for the same
adjective to be gradable with one sense and non-gradable with another sense. For
example:

example sentence adjective sense

He's got a very old car. gradable not young
I saw my old boyfriend yesterday. non-gradable former, ex-
He has some dreadfully common habits. gradable vulgar
"The" is a very common word in English. gradable prevalent
The two countries' common border poses problems. non-gradable shared

Adverbs used with gradable and non-gradable

adjectives
The adverbs really (very much) and fairly and pretty (both meaning "to a significant
degree, but less than very") can often be used with gradable and non-gradable adjectives:

gradable non-gradable
Please don't forget! It's really important. He was really terrified.
He's a fairly rich man. It's a fairly impossible job.
He's pretty tall. It's pretty ridiculous when you think about it.

"Quite" with gradable and non-gradable adjectives

The sense of the adverb "quite" changes according to the gradability of the adjective that
we use it with:

  adjective sense
It's quite warm today. gradable fairly, rather
Are you quite certain? non-gradable completely, absolutely

Reference
Non-gradable adjectives

Although we don't recommend that you learn lists of non-gradable adjectives, here are
some for reference. You can decide for yourself whether they are extreme, absolute or
classifying.

 alive, awful, black, boiling, certain, correct, dead, domestic, enormous,

environmental, excellent, freezing, furious, gigantic, huge, immediately,
impossible, miniscule, mortal, overjoyed, perfect, pregnant, principal, ridiculous,
superb, terrible, terrified, unique, unknown, white, whole

Non-grading adverbs

Again, no need to learn lists. Here are a few examples. There are many more. Remember
that you cannot use all non-grading adverbs with all non-gradable adjectives. Some
collocate (go together). Some don't.

 absolutely, almost, completely, entirely, exclusively, fully, largely, mainly,

nearly, perfectly, practically, primarily, utterly, virtually