-ed and -ing adjectives: bored or boring?

When you use it

Many English adjectives for feelings come in pairs with the same root: bored and boring, interested and interesting, tired and tiring. The two words describe two sides of one feeling. The -ed adjective tells you how someone feels. The -ing adjective tells you about the person, thing or situation that causes the feeling. A long meeting is boring, and the people in it are bored. A football match can be exciting, and then the fans are excited.

A simple test helps: ask who feels it? That person (or animal) gets the -ed form. Then ask what makes them feel it? That thing or person gets the -ing form.

How it is formed

Most pairs come from a verb that means "give someone a feeling": bore, interest, excite, worry. Add -ed or -ing with the normal spelling rules: surprise → surprised, surprising; worry → worried, worrying.

Both forms can stand before a noun (a tiring day, a worried mother) or after verbs like be, feel, look, seem and get (I get bored easily).

Things usually take -ing. A book, a film, a job or the news cannot feel anything, so they are interesting, not interested. Some -ed adjectives can also describe things that show a person's feeling or the mood of a time or place: a worried look, a surprised voice, a relaxed evening.

People can be both, with different meanings. Tom is bored means Tom feels it: he has nothing to do. Tom is boring means other people feel it when they are with him. So I'm boring is not a way to say that you have nothing to do; it is a rather unkind thing to say about yourself. In the same way, Anna is interesting means people enjoy talking to her, while Anna is interested usually needs a topic: interested in history.

Small words after the -ed form. Many -ed adjectives take a preposition before the cause: interested in, worried about, excited about, frightened of, bored with. Note tired of, which means you no longer want something: I'm tired of the rain.

Pairs that break the pattern. A few feelings have a different word for the cause. You feel scared, and a film is scary (scaring is only a verb form: you're scaring me). Frightened and frightening follow the normal pattern and mean almost the same, so scared and frightened are both fine for the person. You feel pleased; for the thing, English normally says pleasant or nice (pleasing exists but is much less common).

Pronunciation. The -ed of these adjectives follows the same rule as regular past forms: an extra syllable /ɪd/ only after /t/ or /d/ (interested, excited, disappointed), otherwise just /d/ (bored, tired, worried) or /t/ (relaxed, embarrassed). The lesson on -s and -ed endings has the full rule.

Examples

• The train was two hours late, and the passengers looked bored.
• Anna is reading an interesting book about the history of her town.
• Tom has always been interested in old maps.
• Moving to a new flat is tiring. After three days of boxes, we were very tired.
• The children are so excited about the holiday by the sea that they cannot sleep.
• The news about the factory is worrying, and many workers are worried about their jobs.
• I found the form on the website really confusing.
• Tom felt embarrassed when his phone rang in the middle of the concert.
• The second half of the game was disappointing.
• Anna's cousin is nice but a bit boring: he only ever talks about his garden.

Common mistakes

• ✗I'm boring. Let's go for a walk.

  ✓ I'm bored. Let's go for a walk.

  Your own feeling takes the -ed form. I'm boring describes the effect you have on other people. Ukrainian says мені нудно, with the person in the dative and no subject I, so nothing in it shows which English form to pick. Russian says мне скучно, with the person in the dative and no subject I, so nothing in it shows which English form to pick. The German phrase for this feeling is built on the adjective that means boring, so that form comes to mind first. In English the person who feels is the subject, and the adjective takes -ed.

• ✗The lesson was very interested.

  ✓ The lesson was very interesting.

  A lesson has no feelings; it causes interest in the people who listen. Ukrainian зацікавлений is used for a person, like interested; a lesson is цікавий, which is interesting. Russian заинтересованный is used for a person, like interested; a lesson is интересный, which is interesting. German makes the same split: interessiert for the person, interessant for the lesson.

• ✗I'm very exciting about the trip.

  ✓ I'm very excited about the trip.

  The speaker feels the excitement, so the -ed form is needed. I'm exciting would mean that you make other people excited. Ukrainian often expresses this with a phrase, я в захваті від поїздки, so there is no ending to copy and learners guess. Russian взволнованный / волнующий are built like excited / exciting, but взволнованный usually means nervous. For happy expectation Russian says жду с нетерпением or в предвкушении, which gives no ending to copy. German aufgeregt (the person) and aufregend (the event) follow the same pattern: -ed matches -t, -ing matches -end.

• ✗It was a tired day.

  ✓ It was a tiring day.

  A day cannot feel tired; it makes you tired. The same goes for a trip, a job or a walk. Ukrainian has a pair too, втомлений / втомливий, but the day is more often called важкий or виснажливий, so the link between the person and the cause is easy to miss, and learners use tired for both. Russian has a pair too, утомлённый / утомительный, but in everyday speech the person is уставший, which has no partner, so learners often use tired for both. German also uses different words, müde for the person and anstrengend or ermüdend for the day; tiring matches anstrengend.

• ✗/rɪˈlæksɪd/, /ɪmˈbærəsɪd/

  ✓ /rɪˈlækst/, /ɪmˈbærəst/

  The written -ed is a syllable only after /t/ or /d/. Relaxed and embarrassed end in /s/, so the ending is a short /t/. Ukrainian spelling has no silent vowels like the e in -ed, so the ending seems to need its own syllable. Russian spelling has no silent vowels like the e in -ed, so the ending seems to need its own syllable. German devoices final consonants, so bored and tired can sound like /bɔːt/ and /ˈtaɪət/. Keep the /d/ voiced.

Practice

The exercises go from easy to harder. Each answer is checked at once. If it is wrong, you get a hint and a second try.