Confused Words: Advice and Advise

Confused Words: Advice and Advise

Hi English learners! How many of you are really sure whether to use advice or advice? Do you know the difference? Well, hopefully, you’ll stop mixing them up after today’s lesson because we’ll discuss the use of commonly confused words: advice and advise.

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Both words are related and they have to do with giving suggestions to someone on how to do something. The main difference is: advice is a noun, while advise is a verb. Also, these words have different pronunciations. Advice is pronounced with s /ədˈvaɪs/; advice is pronounced with z /ədˈvaɪz/.

Advice

Advice is an uncountable noun. In order to think about it countably, use “a piece of advice” or “a bit of advice”:

• May I give you a piece of advice? (not …give you advice)
• The teacher gave me a bit of advice on how to learn French. (not…gave me advice).

You can use advice with the quantifiers such as some, a lot of (lots of), etc. 

• Could I give you some advice on what to wear for the presentation?
• In the book, you will find lots of advice on how to make people listen to you.

Here are some more examples of the noun advice used in context so you can understand the words it collocates with:

• My older colleague offered me advice on how to write a report.
• She doesn’t seem to need advice about her career.
• You should seek advice from a professional on this matter.
• The nutritionist offered me advice on diet.
• You should take your father’s advice and get a safer car.
• All you need to do is follow the doctor’s advice.
• On the advice of her friends, Molly decided to set up an alarm in her house.

Confused words: advice and advise

Advise

Advise is a verb referring to telling someone what to do in a particular situation or giving them advice. Here are some typical examples of the verb advise in context:

• The doctor advised Mark about the treatment for his injury.
• We strongly advise you to stop smoking.
• My friend advised me against buying things in that online shop.
• We were advised to carry our passports with us all the time.
• They asked a solicitor to advise them on the risks of their investments.
• It was an ill-advised and senseless thing to do.
• Mr Johnson was well advised to take winter gear when going to the mountain.

I sincerely hope things are much clearer now and you’ll never mix up these two words again. 😀

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