less vs fewer
Definitions
adjective
- (usually preceded by `no') lower in quality
- (comparative of `little' usually used with mass nouns) a quantifier meaning not as great in amount or degree
- (nonstandard in some uses but often idiomatic with measure phrases) fewer
adverb
- comparative of little
- used to form the comparative of some adjectives and adverbs
Examples
Laura Wade's Posh, timed to open as the Tories edged into power in May 2010, reminded us just what we were in for: overprivileged hooligans in drinking-society blazers who trash a pub as thoughtlessly as they will trash the country.
The bombardment of the GPO had fascinated MacMurrough: the annunciatory puffs of smoke and the flames that roared to greet them; then the crashing gun’s report, the shell’s eruption—an illogical sequence, effect before cause, an object lesson in the madness of war.
Unless the radar signal is normal to some surface (extremely low probability) the radar receives no return.
Definitions
adjective
- (comparative of `few' used with count nouns) quantifier meaning a smaller number of
Examples
People consumed fewer calories without even trying to do so.
Other specialties have undergone relative declines such as orthopedics safer cars and fewer smashed bones.
Digital photography and fewer people taking holidays appear to be the main culprits there.
