Amazing, Excellent, Great!

Today, I will answer Sawako's question about the differences between amazing, excellent and great.

AMAZING: It comes from the verb to amaze which is a positive way to say to surprise. Other words are astonish, astound and dazzle. So it means to make you feel awe, wonder or admiration, to create a strong impression. Basically, you use amazing for things that look or sound really cool. For example:

An amazing view.

An amazing movie.

An amazing song.

These all show that you think the view, song or movie was really good, so good that you were surprised and amazed.

EXCELLENT: It comes from the verb to excel which is a way of saying to be better than others. To excel at something means to be good at something. So it means, to be of the highest quality. Excellent is a bit more formal than amazing or great. The important thing to remember here is excellent comes from excel so it needs to be used with things that are MADE, they are not natural. Excellent is usually used when talking about school. It is often used in writing but not used so often when speaking because it sounds so formal. For example:

An excellent restaurant.

An excellent student.

An excellent view...XXX no! views are not made, they are natural.

GREAT: This is the most useful and commonly used of the three. It is the superlative form of good and means VERY GOOD. It is more casual and can be used about anything. For example:

A great view.

A great movie.

A great book.

A great student.

So I recommend you use great 80% of the time, amazing for things you see and, excellent when talking about education and school.