Buongiorno to all our readers! Today, we’ll be talking about how to describe a person in Italian. People’s differences are something to celebrate – but it does make our lives a little more difficult when learning a foreign language!

Sentence Construction

So you want to describe someone in Italian. Where on Earth do you start? Luckily, the grammar in this is pretty simple.

When describing a person, you would usually use the present tense. Otherwise it would imply that said person is no longer fat/bald/blonde/mean/funny. For today, we’re just going to look at the way people are right now.

Io sono… - I am

Tu sei… - You are…

Lui / Lei è… - He / She is…

Noi siamo… - We are…

Voi siete… - You (pl) are…

Loro sono… - They are…

Although, as we already know, you don’t have to use the subject in Italian.

As you can see, the ending changes for each type of person you’re talking about. REMEMBER: if you are referring to more than one person, and that group is a mixture of men and women, then you would use the MASCULINE PLURAL.

So let’s use these in some example sentences.

But, as with every language in the world, there are a few IRREGULAR ADJECTIVES to keep an eye out for. Luckily, however, these tend to have their own rule for how they agree with different subjects – and it’s arguably easier to remember than the regular ones!!

Some adjectives end (in their singular form) in an ‘e’. What? I hear you ask again. I thought that adjectives ending in ‘e’ meant feminine plural? You’re right. But sometimes it is also the singular form for both men AND women. Huh???

And it really is that simple. When there’s more than one person, the ending changes from an ‘e’ to an ‘i’. See – that wasn’t so bad now, was it?

When we’re talking about jobs, it gets a little more complicated. While in English the sentence would be constructed in the same way for physical traits and for jobs, the Italian is quite different.

In English, we would say both:

He is blond.

He is a waiter.

HOWEVER, in Italian, two different verbs are used.

Lui è biondo.

Lui fa il cameriere.

There are two main differences here between the English and the Italian.

Now that we’ve nailed the grammar side of things, let’s move on to the most important part: the vocabulary.

How to describe a person in Italian: Physical appearance

You should never judge a book by its cover. But when you’re trying to describe a person, it’s often pretty hard to bypass the way they look. Especially in our imaginary police line-up from earlier. Here’s a few lists of some of the most common adjectives describing someone’s physical appearance.

Body shape and build

Hair colours and hairstyles

However, you can also refer to someone as being blonde, or brunette, or ginger, just as you can in English. So make sure you specify whether the PERSON is blonde, or they have blonde HAIR. Take a look at these examples:

He has blonde hair -> Lui ha capelli biondi

He is blonde -> Lui è biondo

Eyes and eye colour

Similarly to someone’s hair, make sure you remember to pluralize all your descriptions of people’s eye colour. It seems simple, but it’s easy to mix up saying that John is green rather than his eyes. Unless John really is green, of course.

Details and Extras

Personality Traits

Even more important than someone’s physical appearance is how they are as a person: their characteristics or personal traits. Imagine now you’re in a job interview, and the interviewer asks you to describe yourself in three words. You’re almost definitely not going to get the job if you say “short, blonde and ugly” are you?

They want to know the kind of person that you are. Here’s our list of characteristics – both good and bad!

Jobs and Professions

Work isn’t everything in life – but when you’re trying to explain what someone is like, it’s a pretty good place to start.

As we’ve already seen earlier in this guide, describing someone’s job can be a little more complicated than describing how they look, as the sentences are constructed differently. But we’ve gone over that.

To make matters just that little bit more complicated, the names of the jobs themselves also change in Italian to match the person you’re describing: namely, whether they’re masculine or feminine.

Usually (thankfully), this tends to follow a pattern. A good example of this would be the word for ‘waiter’ again, CAMERIERE:

As we’ve already seen, when we’re talking about a female waiter (waitress), the word ending simply changes to an ‘a’. Easy.

Unfortunately, it isn’t always that easy. And, even more unfortunately, the only way to know them is to memorise them. Sorry.

Hopefully this list will help start you off. Before you know it, you’ll be remembering them without even consulting our guide. You’ll see. We hope.

Nationalities in Italian

Another defining factor in someone’s personality is often their nationality. Now that the world is becoming so international, people are proud of their roots and where they’ve come from! 

We’ve already spoken about the different ways adjectives of nationality can change depending on who you’re describing. So let’s take a look at some examples of different nationalities.

Real-life Examples

It’s time to put your descriptions to the test with some real-life examples!

We’re going to use a few well-known faces and pair them with some simple physical descriptions, characteristics, nationalities and professions, and give you also an English translation. Let’s get started!

NB: as we have unfortunately never met any of these celebrities, we’re just going to imagine their personality traits.

Chiara Ferragni

Johnny Depp

Ed Sheeran

Conclusion

So, there you have it. Hopefully now you should be well-equipped to describe anyone you know in any situation; be it a police line-up, a job interview, or even a good old game of Guess Who.

Go off and practice for yourself next time you’re scrolling through Instagram and you see a snap of your favourite author/singer/influencer. Practice makes perfect!