List Of Common Grammar Mistakes – Do you find correct grammar intimidating? Not sure if you should use the words “despite” or “despite” in a sentence? Or how to use infinitive verbs?
English is complicated enough that one missing comma can completely change the meaning of everything you want to say:
List Of Common Grammar Mistakes
One of the most common questions from our clients, whether they are experienced proofreaders or full-time students, is how they can avoid the most common grammar mistakes. In this list, we break down some of the most common grammar mistakes we see, based on millions of data points from customers.
Common Mistakes In English
May suggests a possibility; can indicate a hypothetical possibility. I could quit my job – although I’m good at it.
Making an impact involves action: “I want to impact the world in a positive way,” says Jane. Effects describe the results. “The effect of your intention should be good,” replied his friend. Learn more about impact vs. effect Effect here.
Is this too obvious or not? Considering the billions of errors in texting, this might be worth mentioning! Too refers to, too much of something/too much of something: “I have too much money to live in such a small house.”
Two is a number (you know, the one: 2). “To” is a word that is meant to be used in a number of different ways.
Common Grammar Errors (part 2)
Loose refers to something that is out of control. At the same time, defeat is the opposite of victory! “Don’t be afraid to let it go. Besides, what do you have to lose?”
“Can I have a look at the view?” – “Sure, but I heard the view is better from the top”
We have already mentioned what maximum means. However, if you’re wondering, don’t confuse it with pique, which means ‘to stir’ – “my interest was piqued.”
Although both words refer to good things, their meanings are very different. A compliment is something nice you say to someone; Complementary refers to things that go well together.
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Peace of mind refers to a person’s point of view or opinion: “My neighbor’s truck is so loud, it’s time I gave him a piece of mind!”
Meanwhile, peace of mind refers to a mental framework: “Yeah…all that noise is really disturbing my peace of mind.
If you use the word literally, be sure to use it literally! Watered down words do no one any good.
Accents are tricky little beasts. Sometimes missing an oxford comma or two (despite using it grammatically correctly) is a good decision so trust your instincts.
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But sometimes a semicolon is best followed by a comma; in such cases it is fine to use both!
Accents often work well; so don’t use semicolons unnecessarily. (Doesn’t it look weird?)
The exception is if you write a complete sentence in parentheses – like example error #20 above.
“Periods, commas, question marks, exclamation marks, quotation marks within quotation marks, and so on must always be enclosed in quotation marks,” he explained.
Common Grammar Mistakes To Avoid
Hyphens, like the dash to the right, connect two or more related words — hyphens, like the dash to the left, connect two or more related ideas.
But the dash is about the same width as the letter “N” and is meant to indicate a range, like 1-10.
In general, do not use a hyphen to connect two parts of one word. How do we spell “connected” there? Yeah… that’s not true. Unless you’re trying to prove something.
Actually, forget it – be positive. After all, why eliminate the negative when you can promote the positive?
Common Mistakes In English
Have you ever felt like you can’t do anything? Maybe you can’t spell anything right? Please never write like this. Unless you’re writing a tropical novel or something.
And some people don’t like to have spaces around their hyphen – they can be very particular about it. However, bestselling author Tim Ferris left some space around it – so it doesn’t seem like much of a problem.
This is like a mathematical version of the double negative we mentioned earlier. If you are trying to represent a specific number of cents, write the whole decimal, or include the number of cents:
The words although and but often do not mix well. Try to use one, not both!
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“I slept soundly” is true; “I slept well” makes it sound like you need more sleep.
“Friendly” should be used to describe pleasant encounters and such; “friendly” should be used as a synonym for “friendly”.
I have been in Europe for 3 weeks. I have been in Europe a long time ago. If you try to replace ‘since’ and ‘before’ in the sentence above, it won’t work.
Unless, of course, what you really want to say is “assign,” a word that means “to give or assign.”
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“I run fast” and “I run fast” are both correct but have slightly different meanings. If you’re still fast enough, use the ‘run’ version.
Some words are better when they are combined. “Therefore” is a good example. If you use clams like this, don’t try to split them!
“I know how to write.” “I have knowledge of business writing. Although both sentences are grammatically correct, one is less awkward than the other.
“I went to the supermarket and bought eggs. → See how inaccurate that sounds? Make sure you keep your tenses consistent, whether it’s past, present or future tense you’re talking about.
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“He is older than me” works, as does “he is older than me”…but don’t try to reverse it: “he is older than me” and “he is older than me” are both wrong.
“Neither” and “neither” go well together: “He wasn’t stronger or faster, but he was still a great athlete.”
Cardinal numbers relate to absolute values; this is grammar error #66. Serial numbers relate to places; this is the 66th grammatical error recorded.
Normally, numbers under 10 should be written, although there may be one or two valid exceptions to this rule.
Common Mistakes Archivi
Don’t forget to put the word “the” before the relevant items: books, blogs, articles and so on.
If you’re talking about other people, use consistent pronouns: “One should be steady when writing” sounds much better than “one should be steady when writing.”
While most people (e.g. restaurants) would say “first come, first served” what makes more sense is “first come, first served”.
The correct usage is of course ‘should’, ‘should’ and ‘should’. It is an abbreviation for “should”, “should” and “should”.
Common Errors In English Usage
Many people use the phrase “I don’t care” to describe something they don’t really care about. But if you think about it, what they’re trying to say is that they are
“At the restaurant it was just him and me” doesn’t sound as good as “At the restaurant it was just me and him.”
“He and I went to a restaurant” does not sound as good as “he and I went to a restaurant” —
Why? Because if you remove the “I”, the sentence would be “he went to the restaurant”. The correct usage is “he and I went to a restaurant”.
Grammatical Errors: Common Grammar Mistakes In English
For plurals, try Johnsons, 70s, and (if you’re trying to keep up) Joneses instead. But if the Jones family owns something, it belongs to the Jones family (see number 93).
While we’ve all heard the saying “if worse comes to worse”, this makes no sense unless “worse” comes to “worse”.
From the beginning, not from the beginning! For those who don’t know, the literal meaning of this phrase refers to nip a flower in the bud.
Don’t worry: almost everyone is wrong. “Nauseating” technically means being able to make others nauseous; “nausea” means not feeling well.
Most Common Punctuation Errors
What is an impressive word? Contrary to what you may have heard, this does happen – so don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.
Adherents of classical grammar will insist that sentences should never begin with “though,” at least not if they can begin with “though.” In our opinion, use what you think is better.
Contrary to popular belief, run-on sentences are not always long, but only appear when commas and/or other types of punctuation are not like this.
On the other hand, it’s also not a good idea to use too many accents as it can detract from the relaxed, word-to-word flow you should be aiming for.
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“He’s studying math, science and digital photography” might not sound so bad, but why not just say “he’s studying math, science and digital photography” instead?
Besides that; Using semicolons where they are not needed (for example instead of commas) is also not good.
You probably know how to capitalize nouns and the first words of each sentence. But sometimes you also need to use capital letters after a semicolon or the first word in a quote.
Poor grammar can make a bad first impression, whether you’re writing a business email or texting a potential date. People tend to make assumptions about your abilities based on how you communicate. If you’ve made it this far and want to learn how to write better, let’s look at some examples of bad grammar.
Most Common Grammar Errors
One of the most common grammatical errors is usage