Grammar - Plural

The Plural often looks worse than it is. If you want to talk about more than one thing or person you use the plural. In English in most cases you simply ad an s to the end of the noun and you are done. In German you can distinguish eight (!) -often similar- plural forms. The good news is that in the end everything comes down to two forms that strongly depend on the article. So let‘s get started.

The eight official forms are:

SINGULAR - PLURAL

  1. der Lehrer - die Lehrer
  2. der Vater - die Väter
  3. das Auto - die Autos
  4. das Kind - die Kinder
  5. das Land - die Länder
  6. der Fisch - die Fische
  7. der Bart - die Bärte
  8. die Lampe - die Lampen

You can easily see that forms 1+2, 4+5 and 6+7 are actually each the same form with the difference that any word containing an a or o or u often adds an umlaut to the vowel, e.g., ä, ö or ü. Unfortunately this change is not 100% regular, but would still be a good guess. So, knowing about the umlauts, we are left with five forms:

  1. no change
  2. +s
  3. +er
  4. +e
  5. +n

The first three forms (no change / +s / +er) are easily learned and also not particularly unusual. So, let‘s quickly browse through them.

1 | No change

Nouns that end in el, er or chen don‘t have an extra plural ending; however, don’t forget the umlaut.

The rule is: el-er-chen stays el-er-chen

der Löffel (spoon) - die Löffel
der Eimer (bucket) - die Eimer
das Mädchen (girl) - die Mädchen

NOTE: Some words ending in -el still get an -n, because they are feminine, like e.g. “die Klingel” becomes “die Klingeln” — the bell.

2 | Adding an S

A few words end in a, o, u, y or i. Those get an s in the plural. They are few and always of non-German origin.

die Oma granny - die Omas
das Kino cinema - die Kinos
der Uhu owl - die Uhus
das Handy mobile - die Handys
der Pulli sweater - die Pullis

3 | Adding ER

Only 3% of the German nouns end in -er in the plural. [Seriously, there was a Ukrainian who found that out]. You‘ll learn them without problems as they kind of stick out. All of them are either masculine or neuter.

das Kind child - die Kinder
das Land land - die Länder
das Ei egg - die Eier
der Mann man - die Männer
das Rad wheel - die Räder

4 | Adding an E

This plural form is found with 23% of the German nouns. It is reserved mainly for masculine and neuter words. Unfortunately, that‘s only 95% accurate, but better than nothing, right? So if you know the noun is masculine or neuter, but are not familiar with its plural yet, go for -e.

das Regal shelf - die Regale
der Kopf head - die Köpfe
der Berg mountain - die Berge
der Stuhl chair - die Stühle
das Schaf sheep - die Schafe

but:
die Hand hand - die Hände
die Wand wall - die Wände

5 | Adding (E)N

This form is found with 51% of the German nouns. 95% of which are feminine. There are two nice turns to this ending:

a) Any (!) noun ending in -e, regardless of its gender, builds the plural with -n:

die Nase nose - die Nasen
das Auge eye - die Augen
der Pole Pole - die Polen

b) Remember the article signals for the die-article? Words with those endings all end in -(e)n, too:

die Freiheit freedom - die Freiheiten
die Zeitung newspaper - die Zeitungen
die Süßigkeit sweets - die Süßigkeiten

Summary

The plural comes down mainly to knowing whether a noun is either masculine, neuter or feminine.

  • masculine/neuter nouns are ending in -e
  • feminine nouns are ending in -en
  • any (!) noun ending in e builds the plural with n