How to Use Commas

Niall O'Donnell 40 Comments

This is something lots of people wonder. This is something I wonder sometimes, because commas can be quite complicated, and the rules about using them very specific. So if you’re not too concerned about how to use them, let me just say this:

If you use them in writing where you’d pause when speaking, you’ll probably be fine. In a very basic way, they provide a pause for a reader, just as we give ourselves regular pauses when we speak.

But if you want to know a little more, read on…

There are quite a few rules about using commas, so I’m not going to go into a lot of depth about them, even if this is for those of you who really want to know. Mainly, it’s because most of us don’t really need to know that much about how to use them. We tend to use them correctly, as the rules are usually fairly intuitive. And even if you’re not a native speaker, the rules are fairly consistent across different languages. So you’re probably fine already. But let’s crack on, shall we?

To Separate Items in a List

Easy! Exceptions are when you need to use a semicolon for clarity, which is rarely. And of course you can throw in the Oxford Comma if you want. By the way, if you think I’m being lazy by not going into more detail about semicolons and the Oxford Comma, those two links will take you to fascinating articles I’ve already written about them.

When Starting a Sentence with a Dependent Clause

If you have trouble with commas, read this.

The part of that sentence before the comma is a dependent clause because it doesn’t work on its own: it depends on the second part for it to make sense. The second clause is independent because it can work on its own. But look at what happens if we put the independent clause first:

Read this if you have trouble with commas.

If you think in grammar terms about different types of clauses you might get confused, so forget about the terminology and say those two sentences aloud. Notice how you naturally pause after the dependent clause if you begin the sentence with if, but if you begin it with read, you don’t pause.

Note that if you separate two independent clauses with a comma, you’re guilty of using a comma splice. Like so:

He ran up to the grammar nerd, he punched him in the face.

It feels wrong, doesn’t it? Like the two should be more distinct. We can fix this in a few ways. We can simply use two sentences:

He ran up to the grammar nerd. He punched him in the face.

Or we can use a co-ordinating conjunction:

He ran up to the grammar nerd, and he punched him in the face.

Note how we still use the comma here, because the two clauses are independent (if they’re very short, feel free to omit it though).

Before or at the End of a Quotation

He said, “This grammar guy is pretty cool.”

“This grammar guy is pretty cool,” he said.

I sometimes forget this one. And if your quotation is a question, use a question mark instead of a comma.

With Certain Expressions which Begin a Sentence, or Interrupt it

Why, I can’t believe this article about commas is so interesting!

This article, by the way, is fascinating!

I don’t think I need to explain any more here, do I?

To Separate a Statement from a Question Tag

I don’t think I need to explain any more here, do I?

Between Coordinate Adjectives

Now this is where it gets a bit complicated. Remember when I told you about how we have to put adjectives in a certain order? There’s a little more to it than that. Look at these two sentences which you might use any day, repeatedly:

Niall is a tall, dark, handsome chap.

He’s drinking some delicious Spanish red wine.

Commas in the first one, but not the second one. Why? In the first sentence, the adjectives are coordinate adjectives. These means that they’re the same class of adjective, so we can order them any way we want. Dark, tall, handsome. Handsome, dark, tall. And if we wanted, we could put and between them instead of commas: Niall is tall and dark and handsome (again, this is a sentence you can use freely and regularly).

In the second sentence though, the adjectives are cumulative, which means they’re different types, and we have to put them in the right order, without commas. It’d be weird to say red Spanish delicious wine, wouldn’t it? And we also can’t use and:

He’s drinking some delicious and Spanish and red wine.

This is a good rule of thumb to figure out if you should use commas with your adjectives or not: can you use and between the adjectives? If you can, you need commas.

All the Rest

There are some other rules, but they’re pretty minor compared to the heavyweights we’ve already grappled with, so let’s just give them bullet points:

  • To set off the name or term of endearment of someone you’re addressing (very old-fashioned, darling)
  • To separate the day of the month from the year (3rd August, 2017), but not the month from the year! (August 2017)
  • To separate a city from its country or state (Galway, Ireland)
  • Before and after a title (Niall O’Donnell, MSc, is talking, shh!). Also counts for etc. and other abbreviations
  • To separate contrasting parts of a sentence (We’re going here, not there!)
  • If someone’s name contains Jr. or Sr., a comma should follow the surname, and also Jr./Sr. if it occurs midsentence (Martin Luther King, Jr., is one of my heroes.)

This last use of commas caused much surprise recently, like below:

https://twitter.com/mikecolton/status/884843351479992321

People were shocked at the sheer amount of punctuation in that sentence from The New Yorker magazine. And it does look ungainly, but according to the rule above, it’s fine. The apostrophe and S do make it look longer, but they’re necessary in the sentence, and the ,Jr., makes sense for the reasons above. If you’d like to read more about, here’s The New Yorker’s explanation.

Anyway, that’s it really! There might be one or two little obscure uses of commas I haven’t covered, but the above should be more than enough to get you by. And as I said, you probably intuitively use them correctly anyway, and even if you occasionally use a comma with a cumulative adjective, no-one’s really going to notice. And the less formal your writing, the less important your use of commas is anyway. I generally use them correctly in my articles here, but if I’m writing a text message, I’ll happily use commas between independent clauses like I just don’t give a damn. Such messages are short enough that I don’t need to worry too much about the rhythm of the sentences for the reader, because there might only be one sentence in the message.

Hopefully that’s made things nice and clear, and if you have any questions, feel free to let loose in the comments. Oh, and there is one more way to use commas, but I feel like writing about that separately, so expect that tomorrow.

40 thoughts on “How to Use Commas”

  1. You’re using commas as I was taught to in school, but in recent years I’ve read that writers should cut out most commas, including before “but” and “and”)</em>." It could be that these are new American editorial rules? I.e., (an abbreviation also considered passe.)
    She wanted to go shopping that morning so her father gave her $50 and told her to be back in time for dinner.
    Niall may be tall, dark, and handsome but he uses too many commas, according to some Yankee editors. 🙂 (And I'll contradict myself by using the Oxford comma before     and.)

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  2. Sorry, I’m no good with HTML codes! You’re right though, a lot of commas can generally be removed, especially in relatively short sentences. I think I use a lot as I tend to use long sentences, and I’m expected to set an example 😊. I think the best tip for writers is to reread for rhythm, and decide if pauses are needed or not.

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  4. Interesting! I have forgotten much of the grammar I was taught in school, annoyingly! Although some of it still comes naturally, which is good!

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  5. If you use them in writing where you’d pause when speaking, you’ll probably be fine. In a very basic way, they provide a pause for a reader, just as we give ourselves regular pauses when we speak.

    I love this…a pause for the reader…sigh

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  6. I used to tell my students that they threw handfuls of commas at their papers, hoping a few would land in the right place. One of the best ways I know to decide whether or not a comma is needed is to read your sentence aloud. You will naturally pause if there should be a comma.

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  7. I’ve been trying to tone down my comma usage a bit. But you know what? I like a good spattering of commas. Maybe I’m just a sucker for the drama. Also, love your examples, grammar nerd.

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  9. Neat refresher!

    I don’t know why this popped into my head:

    “Veni, vidi, vici” seemingly goes for the good old comma splice—or does it? (Any idea how Latin punctuation worked?) In my head, I translate it as “I came, I saw, I conquered.” However, the Wikipedia article goes for “I came; I saw; I conquered”, which looks weird because few people speak in semicolons.

    Of course, when writing dialogue, comma splice isn’t such a big violation, and is in fact encouraged as a way of emulating speech flow … anyway, all this to say that I think it’s a great tool for conveying informality 🙂 (As I think you said in one of your comments above.)

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  10. I am increasingly minimal when it comes to commas. I don’t use them between a month and year, or with academic qualifications, or with Sr or Jr (I don’t even use a full stop), or even with a simple ‘She said “quotation”.’

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    • I don’t think I use them much in those cases either. I never really consciously use them, instead placing them instinctively, and I know I often forget them in such cases.

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  16. That’s the most sensible thing I’ve read about commas in a long time. I use Grammarly, because it’s quite good at picking up words spelt correctly, but used in the wrong place. Its ideas about commas, however, make me mad.

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  17. Thank you for this post!! I was JUST talking about this not too long ago to my father. I use commas whenever I believe I would pause in conversation, but then I feel like I use too many (I guess I pause A LOT in conversation). My father will then read a post and contact me saying “but you’re always missing some commas”. It’s a never ending battle between us! Lol!

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    • I alternate between both positions! When I write I follow my mental voice and tend to therefore include a lot of commas. But then when I review it it looks like too many. I still keep a lot of them though, for rhythm!

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