Level 1 · Beginner
Not very: 不太
不太 + Adj. / Verb
不太 + adjective is the soft, polite "not very": 不太冷 "not very cold", 不太好 "not great". Chinese speakers lean on it constantly to say something negative without sounding harsh — 我不太喜欢 "I don't really like it" is much gentler than a flat 我不喜欢.
Don't mix it up with 太…了: 太冷了 "too cold!" is an exclamation, while 不太冷 is calm and takes no 了. And 很不冷 is a different thing altogether — 很不 means "very NOT", the opposite of soft.
Examples
今天不太冷。
jīn tiān bù tài lěng
It's not very cold today.
我不太喜欢喝咖啡。
我不太喜歡喝咖啡。
wǒ bù tài xǐ huan hē kā fēi
I don't really like coffee.
他的中文不太好。
tā de zhōng wén bù tài hǎo
His Chinese isn't very good.
学校不太远。
學校不太遠。
xué xiào bù tài yuǎn
The school isn't very far.
Common mistakes
✗ 今天很不冷。
✓ 今天不太冷。
To soften a negative, use 不太 — 很不 makes it stronger, not softer.
Related grammar points
See it in a story
Read this pattern in context: The First Package of the Day (Part 1) · A Lost Afternoon (Part 2) · An Engineer's Morning (Part 1) — free graded stories with tap-to-reveal pinyin and translations.
