10 cool adjectives to avoid using "nagyon" in Hungarian all the time

In today’s Mini Hungarian Lesson, we’ll teach you some adjectives to avoid using “nagyon” all the time. If you’d rather watch a video lesson in Hungarian—with both Hungarian and English subtitles—you can check it out here (it’s free!): 

How to avoid using "nagyon" (very) all the time in Hungarian?

In Hungarian, just like in English, using "very" (nagyon) too frequently can make your speech sound repetitive and less natural. Fortunately, Hungarian has some fantastic compound words that combine the meaning of "very" with adjectives to create more expressive and native-sounding phrases. Check out the following short excerpt from one of our daily START dialogues:

🇭🇺 

• Hé, Ádám, jól vagy?
• Hm, tessék?
• Jól vagy?
• Ja, igen, persze, csak hullafáradt vagyok.
• Igen, azt látom.

🇬🇧

• Hey, Adam, are you okay?
• Hm, what?
• Are you okay?
• Oh, yeah, yeah, I'm just dead tired.
• Yeah, I can see that.

As you can see in the dialogue, instead of saying “nagyon fáradt”, you can use the more expressive and natural-sounding "hullafáradt". This compound word literally means "dead tired" and conveys the same intense feeling of exhaustion in a more Hungarian way.

Here are 10 common expressions where you can replace "nagyon" with a more colorful alternative:

1. hullafáradt (”corpse tired”) = nagyon fáradt (very tired)
2. farkaséhes (”wolf hungry”) = nagyon éhes (very hungry)
3. villámgyors (”lightning fast”) = nagyon gyors (very fast)
4. csigalassú (”snail slow”) = nagyon lassú (very slow)
5. pofonegyszerű (”slap simple”) = nagyon egyszerű (very simple)
6. jéghideg (”ice cold”) = nagyon hideg (very cold)
7. tűzforró (”fire hot”) = nagyon forró (very hot)
8. vadonatúj (brand new) = nagyon új (very new)
9. síkhülye (”plane/flat stupid”) = nagyon hülye (very stupid)
10. koromsötét (”soot dark”) = nagyon sötét (very dark)

Language Learning Tip

Using these compound expressions from time to time instead of simply adding "nagyon" before adjectives all the time will make your Hungarian sound more natural and native-like. These words are commonly used in everyday conversations, so you can find lots of words like these in our daily dialogues, too.

But using synonyms like these is only one of the magic ingredients of sounding more natural. Do you know what other magic ingredients you need? Check out our FREE e-book, Speak Hungarian Like a Native.