The structure introduced here lets us say things like “the cheaper the better” or “the higher you climb, the colder it will get.” In fact, it is a combination of two pieces of grammar that we have already learned: the conditional form (〜ば) and ほど.
Verbs
【Verb: 〜ば】【Verb: Dictionary】ほど
お酒を飲めば飲むほど酔っ払う。
The more you drink, the more drunk you’ll become.
食べれば食べるほど太ってしまう。
The more you eat, the fatter you will get.
人がいればいるほど楽しいです。
The more the merrier.
日本語を勉強すればするほど日本語が上手になります。
The more you study Japanese, the better your Japanese will become.
Note: Observe the omission of 勉強 for the second verb. When using a する verb, the noun portion is obvious from the structure and so does not need to be repeated. We just use する (すればするほど).
決して、お金があればあるほど幸せになるとは言えない。
You cannot definitively say that the more money you have, the happier you will be.
Adjectives
We can also apply the structure to adjectives.
【I-Adjective: 〜ければ】【I-Adjective: Dictionary】ほど
【Na-Adjective: 〜なら】【Na-Adjective: +な】ほど
早ければ早いほどいい。
The faster, the better.
寿司は魚が新鮮なら新鮮なほどおいしい。
For sushi, the fresher the fish, the better.
経験が豊かなら豊かなほど様々な問題に対応できる。
The more experience you have, the more you’ll be able to deal with all sorts of issues.
Omitting the Conditional (Simple Sentences)
For simple, casually spoken sentences, we can also omit the conditional half of the grammar structure entirely.