Exclamative ‘what’ can precede the indefinite article and is, therefore, a predeterminer. Here’s a real example you can listen to:
Here are the most common examples from corpora and completed with common collocates by AI:
here are the sentences with the most common collocates in bold:
- What a great way to save time!
- What a waste of money!
- What a great idea for a party!
- What a way to start the day!
- What a bunch of clowns!
- What a joke! I can’t believe you said that.
- What a shame! I was really looking forward to that.
- What a lot of trouble you’ve caused!
- What a difference! You look so much better now.
- What a wonderful way to end the day!
- What a waste! I could have used that money for something else.
- What a load of nonsense!
- What a mess! I can’t believe I did that.
- What a relief! I thought I was going to be late.
- What a time to be alive!
- What a treat! I’m so glad you’re here.
- What a joke! That’s the funniest thing I’ve ever heard.
- What a mess! I’m going to have to clean this up.
- What a difference a day makes!
- What a great place to live!
These sentences are often used in spoken English to convey strong feelings, and they can add a lot of expressiveness and emotion to your language. They’re less common in formal written English, but you might see them in written dialogue or informal writing. Notice that many of them are followed by adverbial phrases.
Phrases like “to save time”, “for a party”, “to be alive”, etc., are infinitive phrases or prepositional phrases acting as adverbs modifying the noun. They tell us more about the manner, purpose, cause, or result of the noun.
In the English Grammar Profile, A2 point 38 in the category of CLAUSES/exclamations:
‘What a’ + noun phrase and ‘What a’ + noun phrase + clause
However, in the English Vocabulary Profile, ‘what’ is listed at B1 for:
STRONG OPINION: used to give your opinion, especially when you have strong feelings about something
with examples:
- What rubbish!
- What a mess!
- What an awful day!
- What a beautiful soundtrack!
- What an interesting fable!
This PELIC student example also includes a following clause ‘it was‘:
What a trip it was.
Japanese female level 5 grammar class.
An iWeb search for:
. What a * *
1 . WHAT A GREAT WAY 1759
2 . WHAT A WASTE OF 1402
3 . WHAT A GREAT IDEA 1092
4 . WHAT A WAY TO 1015
5 . WHAT A BUNCH OF 755
6 . WHAT A JOKE. 686
7 . WHAT A SHAME. 675
8 . WHAT A LOT OF 615
9 . WHAT A DIFFERENCE! 432
10 . WHAT A WONDERFUL WAY 401
11 . WHAT A WASTE. 383
12 . WHAT A LOAD OF 366
13 . WHAT A MESS. 365
14 . WHAT A RELIEF! 363
15 . WHAT A TIME TO 314
16 . WHAT A TREAT! 298
17 . WHAT A JOKE! 292
18 . WHAT A MESS! 284
19 . WHAT A DIFFERENCE A 282
20 . WHAT A GREAT PLACE 250
We used the above results to get some possible collocates for each sentence using AI. It supposedly used the Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA) to find the most frequent words that follow each phrase. I put the collocates in bold.
- WHAT A GREAT WAY to start/end the day/week/year
- WHAT A WASTE OF time/money/energy/resources
- WHAT A GREAT IDEA for a book/movie/project/gift
- WHAT A WAY TO go/live/die/say goodbye
- WHAT A BUNCH OF crap/liars/losers/nonsense
- WHAT A JOKE. That’s/He’s/She’s/It’s
- WHAT A SHAME. I’m/You’re/He’s/She’s
- WHAT A LOT OF fun/trouble/work/noise
- WHAT A DIFFERENCE! It/That/You/He/She
- WHAT A WONDERFUL WAY to spend the day/night/holiday/weekend
- WHAT A WASTE. It’s/That’s/He’s/She’s
- WHAT A LOAD OF crap/bullshit/garbage/nonsense
- WHAT A MESS. It’s/This is/That was/I’m
- WHAT A RELIEF! I’m/You’re/He’s/She’s
- WHAT A TIME TO be alive/get sick/have a baby/fall in love
- WHAT A TREAT! It was/That was/This is/You are
- WHAT A JOKE! He’s/She’s/It’s/That’s
- WHAT A MESS! We’re/They’re/You’re/I’m
- WHAT A DIFFERENCE A day/year/month/week makes!
- WHAT A GREAT PLACE to live/work/stay/visit
21 . WHAT A WASTE! 241
22 . WHAT A DIFFERENCE IT 237
23 . WHAT A GREAT TIME 235
24 . WHAT A SHAME! 234
25 . WHAT A DEAL! 228
26 . WHAT A RELIEF. 220
27 . WHAT A DIFFERENCE. 219
28 . WHAT A GREAT OPPORTUNITY 213
29 . WHAT A PIECE OF 202
30 . WHAT A FUN WAY 199
31 . WHAT A GREAT EXPERIENCE 192
32 . WHAT A BLESSING! 189
33 . WHAT A JOY TO 187
34 . WHAT A PAIN! 182
35 . WHAT A SURPRISE! 182
36 . WHAT A GREAT GIFT 176
37 . WHAT A GREAT DAY 175
38 . WHAT A JOY IT 174
39 . WHAT A CONCEPT! 174
40 . WHAT A RELIEF TO 170
41 . WHAT A SHAME THAT 170
42 . WHAT A SURPRISE. 170
43 . WHAT A PAIN. 164
44 . WHAT A BLESSING TO 160
45 . WHAT A DISAPPOINTMENT. 156
46 . WHAT A TREAT TO 156
47 . WHAT A PAIN IN 154
48 . WHAT A PLEASANT SURPRISE 151
49 . WHAT A GREAT PRODUCT 149
50 . WHAT A BETTER WAY 148
51 . WHAT A BLESSING IT 146
52 . WHAT A GUY! 146
53 . WHAT A SHAME, 145
54 . WHAT A NIGHTMARE. 139
55 . WHAT A PERFECT WAY 139
56 . WHAT A GUY. 134
57 . WHAT A WONDERFUL THING 132
58 . WHAT A TREAT. 128
59 . WHAT A CONCEPT. 127
60 . WHAT A PLEASURE TO 126
61 . WHAT A MISTAKE! 121
62 . WHAT A NIGHTMARE! 116
63 . WHAT A GIFT! 115
64 . WHAT A PITY. 115
65 . WHAT A GREAT GUY 112
66 . WHAT A WONDERFUL GIFT 110
67 . WHAT A GREAT JOB 108
68 . WHAT A GREAT FEELING 108
69 . WHAT A BUMMER. 107
70 . WHAT A MISTAKE. 107
71 . WHAT A PRIVILEGE TO 106
72 . WHAT A COINCIDENCE. 105
73 . WHAT A NICE SURPRISE 105
74 . WHAT A FIND! 102
75 . WHAT A DAY! 102
76 . WHAT A BARGAIN! 101
77 . WHAT A TIME SAVER 101
78 . WHAT A COINCIDENCE! 100
79 . WHAT A PITY THAT 100
80 . WHAT A WONDERFUL IDEA 100
81 . WHAT A GREAT THING 97
82 . WHAT A DISAPPOINTMENT! 96
83 . WHAT A WONDERFUL EXPERIENCE 96
84 . WHAT A BLESSING. 93
85 . WHAT A PLEASURE IT 92
86 . WHAT A GREAT STORY 91
87 . WHAT A FANTASTIC WAY 91
88 . WHAT A WONDERFUL, 91
89 . WHAT A BEAUTIFUL PLACE 89
90 . WHAT A SHAME IT 89
91 . WHAT A GREAT AND 88
92 . WHAT A NOVEL IDEA 88
93 . WHAT A CROCK. 85
94 . WHAT A RIP OFF 85
95 . WHAT A PITY! 83
96 . WHAT A BRILLIANT IDEA 82
97 . WHAT A GREAT GROUP 82
98 . WHAT A WONDERFUL SURPRISE 82
99 . WHAT A JOKE, 80
100 . WHAT A DIFFERENCE IN 80
A2:
brilliant,difference,fantastic,gift,guy,idea,mistake,off,
pain,perfect,piece,pity,pleasant,shame,story,surprise,way,wonderful
EXPERT EXAMPLE:
I thought: What a load of tosh.
*higher-level language hides our grammar here.