Distinguishing Between Beautiful & Gorgeous

Key Difference – Beautiful vs Gorgeous

Beautiful and gorgeous are two adjectives that are used to praise the physical appearance of someone or something. Both these adjectives are used to describe beauty. Beautiful means pleasing the senses or mind aesthetically, while gorgeous means very beautiful or attractive. The difference between beautiful and gorgeous lies in the degree of beauty; gorgeous is more complimentary than beautiful.

What Does Beautiful Mean?

When something has qualities that delight or appeal to the senses, we describe that thing as beautiful. The adjective beautiful can be used to describe people, places, and objects. Let’s look at some example sentences to learn how this adjective is usually used in the language.

Their house is really small, but they have a beautiful garden.
Your daughter is very beautiful.
I read a beautiful poem yesterday.
Helene was the most beautiful mortal woman on earth.
His beautiful emerald eyes never noticed me.
The beautiful actress refused to make any comments about her next film.
Kandy is a stunningly beautiful city, and we loved our stay there.

When we are talking about the beauty of people, beautiful is usually used to describe women; the equivalent term that is used to describe men is handsome. Beautiful is sometimes also used to refer to the standard or quality. Here, it is equivalent to excellent.

The sunset was beautiful.

What Does Gorgeous Mean?

Gorgeous means very attractive and beautiful. This adjective is usually used to describe the physical attributes of a person or a thing. When compared to beautiful, gorgeous may mean beauty that surpasses beautiful. For example, the American Heritage dictionary defines gorgeous as “dazzlingly beautiful or magnificent”.

Her daughter is absolutely gorgeous.
You are wearing a gorgeous dress.
He is gorgeous; he has sparkling blue eyes and sexy full lips.
You have a gorgeous voice, why don’t you become a singer?
The dress was a gorgeous deep icy blue color.

In informal English, gorgeous can also be the same as wonderful, excellent, or delightful. Ex: It was a gorgeous summer.

She is wearing a gorgeous dress.

What is the difference between Beautiful and Gorgeous?

Definition:
Beautiful means pleasing the senses or mind aesthetically.
Gorgeous means very beautiful or attractive.

Gender:
Beautiful is mostly used to describe women, not men.
Gorgeous can be used to describe both men and women.

Use:
Beautiful is used to describe people, places, objects, and phenomena.
Gorgeous is almost always used to describe people, physical features of people, or objects.

Standard vs Informal:
Beautiful can be used to refer to the status or standard of something, in Standard English.
Gorgeous can mean delightful or excellent in informal English.

Image Courtesy: Pixabay