Advice or Advices? Getting Your Grammar Straight

Okay, let’s talk about something that trips up a surprising number of people, myself included sometimes when I’m typing too fast late at night (Luna, my cat, usually judges me silently from the corner). It’s the whole ‘advice’ versus ‘advices’ thing. Seems simple, right? But language, like a complex recipe, often has subtle ingredients and rules that aren’t immediately obvious. I was actually editing a piece for Chefsicon.com the other day, something about optimizing kitchen workflows – you know, my usual jam these days, blending my marketing brain with my love for all things culinary – and I stumbled across someone using ‘advices’. It pulled me up short. Is that even a word? Well, kinda, but usually… not the way most people try to use it.

Working from my home office here in Nashville, surrounded by the sounds of the city and fueled by way too much coffee, I find myself thinking about these little linguistic quirks. They matter. Clear communication is everything, whether you’re writing a marketing plan, explaining a new kitchen protocol, or just trying to give a friend some helpful pointers. Using words correctly builds credibility. Using them incorrectly… well, it can make your message fuzzy, or worse, make you look like you haven’t done your homework. It’s like using salt when the recipe clearly called for sugar – the end result just isn’t right.

So, I decided to dive deep into this. Why is ‘advice’ so tricky? What’s the actual rule? And are there *any* situations where ‘advices’ might be okay? Stick with me here. We’re going to untangle this knot together. By the end of this, you’ll understand the difference, why it exists, and how to use ‘advice’ confidently every single time. We’ll look at the grammar behind it, common mistakes, and maybe even touch on why these rules exist in the first place. Consider this your friendly guide, straight from my little corner of Music City, on mastering this particular piece of English.

Untangling the Grammar: The Heart of the Matter

Advice as an Uncountable Noun

Alright, let’s get down to brass tacks. The fundamental reason ‘advice’ usually doesn’t take an ‘s’ is because it’s an uncountable noun (also called a mass noun). Think about other uncountable nouns: water, sand, information, furniture, music, traffic. You wouldn’t say ‘waters’ (unless you mean large bodies of water, a different context), ‘sands’ (unless referring to specific types or desert expanses), ‘informations’, ‘furnitures’, ‘musics’, or ‘traffics’. These words represent concepts, substances, or collections that we don’t typically count individually in their general sense. You can’t have *three* traffics on the way home, you just have traffic, maybe a lot of it. It’s a general mass.

Advice falls squarely into this category. It refers to guidance or recommendations offered with regard to prudent action. It’s a general concept, a type of input. You don’t receive ‘one advice’ and ‘another advice’ as distinct units in the same way you receive ‘one apple’ and ‘another apple’. Instead, you receive ‘advice’. It might be a lot of advice, it might be a little advice, it might be good advice or bad advice, but grammatically, it’s treated as a singular mass. This is the absolute core concept. Understanding the uncountable nature of advice is step one. It’s not about the quantity in terms of number of suggestions, but the *type* of thing it is – a general offering of guidance. It’s a bit abstract, I know, but hang in there.

Making Advice ‘Countable’: The Power of Phrasing

So, if ‘advice’ is uncountable, how do we talk about specific instances or quantities of it? This is where English gets clever (or maybe just complicated, depending on your perspective). We use helper phrases. Instead of saying “He gave me three advices,” which sounds jarring to a native speaker’s ear, we say things like: “He gave me three pieces of advice.” Or, “He offered several items of advice.” Or even just, “He gave me some advice.” The words ‘pieces’ or ‘items’ or ‘bits’ act as the countable units, allowing us to quantify the uncountable noun ‘advice’. Think of it like water again. You don’t count ‘waters’, but you can count ‘glasses of water’, ‘bottles of water’, or ‘liters of water’. The container or measure makes it countable.

This quantifying phrase approach is crucial. It respects the uncountable nature of ‘advice’ while still letting us talk about specific recommendations. Other examples include: “Let me give you a word of advice.” “She shared a few helpful tips” (using a synonym like ‘tips’ which *is* countable is another common workaround). Mastering these phrases like “piece of advice” is key to sounding natural and grammatically correct. It might feel a bit clunky at first, especially if your native language handles abstract nouns differently, but it’s the standard pattern in English. It’s a bit like needing the right size pan for a specific amount of batter – the container matters for the quantity.

The Historical Trail: Where Did ‘Advice’ Come From?

Sometimes, understanding *why* a word behaves the way it does helps solidify the rule. ‘Advice’ entered English from Old French (‘avis’), which itself likely came from the Latin phrase ‘ad visum’, meaning something like “in my view” or “how it seems to me.” Initially, in French and early English, it often related to an opinion or a judgment. The sense evolved towards recommendation or counsel. Importantly, its grammatical behavior as an uncountable noun seems to have solidified relatively early in its English usage. While language is always evolving, the uncountable nature of ‘advice’ has remained remarkably stable for centuries.

Tracing the etymology isn’t just academic trivia; it highlights that the word’s core meaning relates to a general perspective or suggestion, not necessarily discrete, countable points. This historical context reinforces its classification as a mass noun. Unlike some words that have shifted between countable and uncountable over time, ‘advice’ has largely stayed its course. There wasn’t really a period where ‘advices’ was standard common usage for multiple suggestions. Knowing this historical usage pattern helps understand why modern grammar guides are so firm on this point. It’s not an arbitrary rule someone made up recently; it’s rooted in the word’s long journey into modern English.

The Very Rare Exception: When ‘Advices’ Might Appear

Now, here’s where things get slightly murky, and where you *might* occasionally see ‘advices’ used correctly, although it’s rare and usually confined to specific, often formal or archaic, contexts. The most common legitimate use of ‘advices’ is in financial, commercial, or legal contexts, where it means formal notifications or official reports, often containing information or intelligence. For example, a bank might refer to ‘remittance advices’, which are documents detailing payments made. Or in older maritime language, ‘advices’ could refer to dispatches or news received from ships or foreign posts. Think of it as meaning ‘pieces of information’ or ‘reports’ rather than ‘pieces of counsel’.

However, this usage is highly specialized and sounds quite dated in most general conversation. If you write “Please send the latest advices regarding the shipment,” in a business context, it *might* be understood, but it carries a very formal, slightly old-fashioned tone. For 99.9% of everyday situations, when you mean recommendations or suggestions, ‘advices’ is incorrect. Using it in the sense of ‘formal notification’ is a specific jargon use case. It’s crucial not to confuse this niche meaning with the common meaning of giving someone suggestions. So, unless you’re drafting 19th-century shipping manifests or specific financial documents, stick with ‘advice’. Maybe this distinction is subtle? I think it’s important though.

Common Mistakes and Why They Happen

So why do people make the mistake of saying ‘advices’? There are a few likely culprits. One is influence from other languages. Many Romance languages, for instance, have countable nouns for the equivalent of ‘advice’ (like ‘consejo’ in Spanish which can become ‘consejos’, or ‘consiglio’ in Italian becoming ‘consigli’). Speakers transferring their native grammar patterns might naturally pluralize ‘advice’. Another reason is overgeneralization of English rules. We learn that most nouns add an ‘s’ to become plural (cat/cats, dog/dogs, suggestion/suggestions), and it’s easy to mistakenly apply this rule to uncountable nouns like advice, especially when you *are* thinking of multiple distinct points.

Finally, sometimes people just haven’t been explicitly taught or corrected. It sounds *kind of* logical if you think about getting multiple suggestions, right? This language transfer issue and rule overgeneralization are common sources of error for many English grammar points, not just ‘advice’. Sometimes, even native speakers get it wrong if they haven’t paid close attention or if they’re speaking quickly. It’s a reminder that language learning, even in your native tongue, is an ongoing process. We pick up habits, good and bad, and sometimes need to consciously correct them. I catch myself making small errors all the time when I’m not focusing – happens to the best of us.

Related Uncountable Nouns: Seeing the Pattern

Understanding ‘advice’ becomes easier when you see it as part of a larger pattern. Recognizing other common uncountable nouns helps reinforce the concept. Think about words like: information (we say ‘pieces of information’, not ‘informations’), news (always singular, ‘the news is good’, not ‘the news are good’, and we might say ‘items of news’), knowledge (uncountable, though ‘knowledges’ exists in very specific academic contexts meaning fields of study), luggage/baggage (uncountable, we count ‘bags’ or ‘suitcases’), research (uncountable, we talk about ‘studies’ or ‘pieces of research’), evidence (uncountable, ‘pieces of evidence’), and progress (uncountable, we talk about ‘steps’ or ‘stages’ of progress).

Seeing ‘advice’ within this group of related concepts helps solidify the grammatical rule. They often represent abstract ideas, collections, or substances that aren’t easily broken down into individual units in typical usage. Recognizing this pattern makes the rule feel less arbitrary and more like a consistent feature of English grammar. It’s like recognizing a family of ingredients in cooking – once you understand the properties of one (like how acids react), you can better predict how related ones will behave. This pattern recognition is a useful tool for mastering grammatical nuances. Does this make sense? I hope so.

Why Does Correct Usage Matter? Clarity and Credibility

Okay, so we’ve established the rule. But does it *really* matter if you slip up and say ‘advices’? In the grand scheme of things, maybe not world-ending. But in communication, especially professional or written communication, details matter. Using words correctly, like ‘advice’ instead of ‘advices’, contributes to clarity. Your reader or listener doesn’t stumble, even subconsciously, over an awkward phrasing. They just get the message. More importantly, perhaps, it affects your credibility. Fair or not, people often judge intelligence and competence based on language use. Consistently making basic grammatical errors can undermine the authority and professionalism of your message.

Think about it from my marketing background. If an ad campaign is full of typos or grammatical mistakes, does it inspire confidence in the product or service? Probably not. It suggests carelessness or a lack of attention to detail. The same applies to reports, emails, presentations, blog posts (like this one!), or even just spoken communication in important settings. Ensuring grammatical accuracy, even on seemingly small points like advice/advices, shows respect for your audience and reinforces the idea that you know what you’re talking about. It’s about presenting yourself and your ideas in the best possible light. Precision builds trust.

Practical Tips: Getting it Right Every Time

So, how can you make sure you’re using ‘advice’ correctly moving forward? Here are a few practical strategies:

• Remember the Uncountable Rule: Drill it into your head: Advice = Uncountable. Like water or sand.
• Use Quantifiers: When you need to talk about specific instances, use phrases like “piece of advice,” “bit of advice,” “item of advice,” or “word of advice.”
• Consider Synonyms: If you’re talking about multiple specific points, sometimes using a countable synonym works better. Words like “suggestions,” “recommendations,” “tips,” “pointers,” or “guidelines” are all countable and can often convey a similar meaning. Choose the one that best fits your context.
• Proofread Carefully: Especially in writing, take a moment to scan for ‘advices’. If you find it, check the context. Is it the rare financial/formal notification sense? If not, change it to ‘advice’ or rephrase using a quantifier or synonym.
• Listen and Read Actively: Pay attention to how careful speakers and writers use the word ‘advice’. You’ll notice the patterns we’ve discussed.

These practical strategies aren’t complicated, but they require conscious effort initially. Like learning a new technique in the kitchen, it takes practice until it becomes second nature. The key is awareness and repetition. Eventually, ‘advice’ will feel right, and ‘advices’ will sound wrong in most contexts.

The Verb Form: ‘Advise’ vs ‘Advice’

Another common point of confusion related to ‘advice’ is distinguishing it from its verb form, ‘advise’. This is a different issue than advice/advices, but it’s closely related and often trips people up. Remember:

• Advice (with a ‘c’) is the noun: “She gave me some good advice.” (rhymes with ‘ice’)
• Advise (with an ‘s’) is the verb: “I advise you to be careful.” (rhymes with ‘realize’)

The spelling difference is subtle (‘c’ vs ‘s’), but the pronunciation and grammatical function are distinct. ‘Advice’ is the *thing* (the recommendation), while ‘advise’ is the *action* (the act of recommending). Mixing these up is another common error that can affect clarity and professionalism. For example, writing “Please advice me” instead of “Please advise me” is incorrect. Keeping the noun/verb distinction clear is just as important as knowing ‘advice’ is uncountable. It’s another layer of precision in language. You need both the right ingredient (advice) and the right cooking method (advise).

Cultural Nuances and Global English

It’s also worth briefly touching on how this plays out in global English. As English is used by more non-native speakers worldwide, variations in grammar inevitably occur. In some varieties of English, influenced by other language structures, the use of ‘advices’ might be more common or less jarring. However, in standard British and American English, the forms taught internationally and expected in formal/professional contexts, ‘advice’ remains firmly uncountable. While acknowledging linguistic diversity is important, if your goal is to communicate effectively in standard international English, adhering to the uncountable rule for ‘advice’ is the safest and most widely accepted approach.

Understanding these global English variations helps contextualize why you might encounter ‘advices’ sometimes, but it doesn’t change the standard rule. For broad communication, especially in writing intended for a wide audience (like, say, a blog reaching millions – gotta keep my Chefsicon readers happy!), sticking to standard grammar ensures the widest comprehension and maintains expected conventions. It’s about choosing the right tool for the job, and in this case, standard English usage is often the most effective tool for broad communication. This isn’t about linguistic superiority, just practical communication choices in a globalized world. Maybe I’m overthinking this, but clarity across different backgrounds feels important.

Final Thoughts on Giving Good… Guidance

So, there you have it. The long and short of ‘advice’ versus ‘advices’. It boils down to that core concept: ‘advice’ is an uncountable noun in standard English. You can have ‘some advice’ or ‘a piece of advice’, but not typically ‘an advice’ or ‘three advices’. The exception for ‘advices’ meaning formal notifications is rare and specific. It seems like such a small thing, doesn’t it? Just one little ‘s’. But language is built on these small things, these agreed-upon conventions that allow us to share complex ideas relatively easily. Getting them right smooths the path for communication.

From my perspective, sweating these small details, whether it’s the grammar in a blog post or the precise measurement in a recipe, or the flow in a kitchen layout, it’s all part of the same drive for clarity and effectiveness. It’s about understanding the system, respecting the rules (even while questioning them sometimes!), and ultimately, communicating better. Maybe I’m just a word nerd living in Nashville with my cat Luna, but I think these things matter. Hopefully, this little deep dive helps you feel more confident the next time you’re offering or receiving some valuable… advice.

What other grammar points do you find tricky? It’s a constant learning process, isn’t it? I wonder if focusing too much on these rules stifles creativity, or if it actually provides a framework *for* creativity? Hmm. Something to ponder while I figure out what’s for dinner. Probably involves experimenting with some Nashville hot chicken recipe – now *that’s* a system with complex rules and fiery results!

FAQ

Q: So, is it ever correct to say ‘advices’?
A: Generally, no, not when you mean suggestions or recommendations. ‘Advice’ is an uncountable noun. The plural form ‘advices’ is only correctly used in very specific, often formal or archaic, contexts, typically in finance, law, or commerce, meaning ‘formal notifications’ or ‘official reports of information’. For everyday use, stick with ‘advice’ or use phrases like ‘pieces of advice’.

Q: How can I remember if a noun is countable or uncountable?
A: It often takes practice and exposure. Ask yourself: can I put a number directly before it (one advice? two furnitures?)? Does it sound natural with ‘a’ or ‘an’ (an information? a research?)? If the answer is no, it’s likely uncountable. Looking nouns up in a good dictionary also helps, as they usually indicate if a noun is countable [C] or uncountable [U].

Q: What’s the difference between ‘advice’ and ‘advise’ again?
A: ‘Advice’ (with a ‘c’, rhymes with ‘ice’) is the noun – the recommendation itself (e.g., “Thank you for the advice.”). ‘Advise’ (with an ‘s’, rhymes with ‘realize’) is the verb – the action of giving the recommendation (e.g., “I advise you to leave early.”).

Q: Are there other words like ‘advice’ that cause similar confusion?
A: Yes, many uncountable nouns can be tricky. Common examples include ‘information’ (not ‘informations’), ‘knowledge’, ‘research’, ‘evidence’, ‘furniture’, ‘luggage’, ‘traffic’, and ‘news’. They all follow similar patterns where you need quantifier phrases (like ‘piece of’, ‘item of’) to talk about specific instances or amounts.

@article{advice-or-advices-getting-your-grammar-straight,
    title   = {Advice or Advices? Getting Your Grammar Straight},
    author  = {Chef's icon},
    year    = {2025},
    journal = {Chef's Icon},
    url     = {https://chefsicon.com/advice-or-advices-which-is-correct/}
}