Quiz-Tree

Suffixes

Recognizing a suffix tells you a word's grammatical role and narrows its meaning. Combined with a root clue and context, that's often enough to decode a word you've never seen before.

1. Abstract Noun Suffixes: State, Quality, and Process

This quiz covers five suffixes that convert verbs and adjectives into abstract  nouns: -tion/-sion, -ity/-ty, -ness, -ment,  and -ance/-ence. These endings appear constantly in SAT reading and  writing passages. After completing this quiz, you will be able to spot these  suffixes in unfamiliar words and use them to infer meaning.
10 questions
average score: 65% (all users)

2. Suffixes that indicate Agents, Beliefs, and Making

Five suffixes here do two distinct jobs. -er/-or, -ism, and  -ist build nouns that name people and the beliefs they hold, while  -ize/-ise and -ify build verbs expressing change. After this  quiz, you will be able to identify agents and practitioners in unfamiliar  vocabulary, and recognize when a verb suffix signals a process of making or  becoming.
10 questions

3. Suffixes for Action Verbs and Descriptive Adjectives

Adjectives do the heavy descriptive work in SAT passages, and three of the  suffixes here — -ous/-ious, -al/-ial, and -ic/-ical  — specialize in building them. The verb-forming suffixes -ate and  -en round out the set. After this quiz, you will be able to decode  unfamiliar adjectives and identify the quality or relationship they express.
10 questions

4. Suffixes for Tendency, Capability, and Manner

Four suffixes remain after three full topic quizzes, each doing a specific job:  -ive/-ative signals tendency, -able/-ible signals capability,  -ent/-ant marks a quality or person, and -ly turns adjectives  into adverbs. Because only four suffixes are covered, this quiz has 8 questions  rather than 10. After completing it, you will have encountered all 19 suffixes  in this set.
8 questions

5. Review 1

This review draws one or two word parts from each topic quiz and tests them in fresh words. It is  designed to surface which suffixes have settled and which still need more  practice. Difficulty is comparable to the topic quizzes.
10 questions

6. Review 2

This review tests a fresh set of five word parts from  across all four topic quizzes and steps up the difficulty. Bridge questions use  less familiar vocabulary, and the challenge phase requires working through  longer, more complex roots. After completing it, you will have reviewed ten of  the nineteen suffixes in the set.
10 questions

7. Review 3

This third review introduces the highest difficulty level in  the series so far. Bridge questions use vocabulary rarely encountered outside  formal reading, and challenge questions require sustained attention to Latin  roots. Five more suffixes from the full set of nineteen appear here for the  first time in a review quiz.
10 questions

8. Review 4

None of the questions name a suffix — you must identify the word part yourself, combine it with the  root clue given, and reason toward the meaning. All ten words appear at or above the SAT difficulty threshold.
10 questions

You will master 19 high-frequency SAT suffixes — word parts that convert verbs into nouns, roots into adjectives, and familiar words into the advanced vocabulary that appears throughout college-level reading. These endings are organized into four thematic groups: abstract nouns, agents and beliefs, action verbs and descriptive adjectives, and words of tendency and capability.

Each of the four topic quizzes moves through three phases: direct definition questions to anchor each suffix's meaning, context-based questions to build inference skills, and SAT-level vocabulary to test real understanding. Four cumulative review quizzes then spiral back through the full set at increasing difficulty, reinforcing earlier learning while introducing harder words.

You may already know more suffixes than you think. The SAT rewards students who can break an unfamiliar word into parts and reason through its meaning. Common suffixes like -ible, -ment, -ize, and -ity appear constantly.

Focus on what each suffix signals about a word's function in a sentence. A wrong part of speech eliminates an answer choice immediately, so using suffixes to filter options quickly can save you real time.

By the end of the set, you will be able to encounter a word like circumspection or intransigent for the first time and reason toward its meaning — not by guessing, but by recognizing the suffix and applying what you know.