Singulier et pluriel – Singular and plural
We are talking here about the singular and plural versions of nouns and adjectives. Most of the time you need to add a final “s” when the word is plural. But as you know, the French language is full of surprises 😉
Règle générale – General rule
For nouns and adjectives, the general rule is to add a s at the end of word when it is plural. Let’s see some examples:
| 🇫🇷 Français singulier | 🇫🇷 Français pluriel | 🇬🇧 Anglais | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| une télévision | des télévisions | a television – televisions | ||
| un grand appartement | des grands appartements | a big apartment – bigs apartments | ||
| la ville | les villes | the city – cities | ||
| ma petite soeur | mes petites soeurs | my little sister – my little sisters |
When a noun already ends with a -s, -z or -x when it is singular, there is no need to add an extra s for the plural version:
| 🇫🇷 Français singulier | 🇫🇷 Français pluriel | 🇬🇧 Anglais | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| un pays | des pays | a country – countries | ||
| le gaz | les gaz | the gas – the gases |
Cas particuliers – Particular cases
The point at this stage of your learning process is not to remember all the different cases but to get a big picture of what you can encounter in the French grammar. Here are some interesting cases for common words:
| 🇫🇷 Français singulier | 🇫🇷 Français pluriel | 🇬🇧 Anglais | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| un travail | des travaux | a work – works |
For most of the nouns ending with –al, the plural is –aux.
| 🇫🇷 Français singulier | 🇫🇷 Français pluriel | 🇬🇧 Anglais | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| un cheval | des chevaux | a horse – horses | ||
| un journal | des journaux | a newspaper – newspapers |
7 words ending in –ou have a plural in –oux. Here are the most common ones:
| 🇫🇷 Français singulier | 🇫🇷 Français pluriel | 🇬🇧 Anglais | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| un bijou | des bijoux | a jewel – jewellery | ||
| un chou | des choux | a cabbage – cabbages | ||
| un genou | des genoux | a knee – knees |
Singular nouns ending by –eu, –au or –eau will have an extra x when becoming plural.
| 🇫🇷 Français singulier | 🇫🇷 Français pluriel | 🇬🇧 Anglais | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| un cheveu | des cheveux | a hair – hair | ||
| un manteau | des manteaux | a coat – coats | ||
| Il est beau. | Ils sont beaux. | He is handsome. They are handsome. |