PLURAL IN ITALIAN: AN EASY WAY TO CHANGE WORDS TO PLURAL

The Plural Form in Italian (Simple Rules)

Today I’ll show you some simple rules to make the plural form in Italian; but before you continue, make sure you know about the word gender (if you can’t tell whether a noun is masculine or feminine, you’re missing a piece!). You can review my lesson here or watch the video below.

If you already know all about the word gender in Italian, keep reading!

An Easy Method for Changing a Word to Plural (in Italian)

Making the plural in Italian is gonna be much easier with these simple rules. Although they’re only general guidelines (and you’ll need to watch out for the exceptions), it’s a great starting point! 

First of all, you need to look at two things when you change a word to its plural form:

1. the word’s ending (what’s the last letter of the noun?)
2. the word’s gender (is the name masculine or feminine?) 

Once you know that, you can basically change all Italian words to plural. In the next sections, I’ll show you exactly how.

1. Plural of Italian Names Ending in “A” 

Let’s start with the plural of those names ending with the vowel “A”. Most of these words are feminine, but there are some masculine ones too.

So this is the rule: if the noun is masculine (less common), the “A” turns into an “I” in its plural form; while if it’s feminine, you replace the “A” with an “E“. Look at the examples below.

Examples (Plural of Words ending in “A”):

Here you are some examples of masculine words: 

• Problema / Problemi (problem/s) 
• Pilota / Piloti (pilot/s)
• Pigiama / Pigiami (pajamas)
• Pianeta / Pianeti (planet/s) 

The following are instead feminine names: 

• Porta / Porte (door/s) 
• Sorella / Sorelle (sister/s)
• Palestra / Palestre (gym/s)
• Tazza / Tazze (cup/s)

2. Words ending in “E” (Plural)

The words ending in “E” are pretty common in Italian and can be both masculine and feminine. Their plural is quite easy to make: you just change the “E” into an “I”, no matter the gender of the noun.  

Plural when a Word Ends in “E” (Examples)

Here you can see the plural of some masculine words where the last letter is an “E”:   

• Cane/ Cani (dog/s) 
• Colore / Colori (colour/s)
• Fiume / Fiumi (river/s)
• Piede / Piedi (foot/feet)

Whereas the following names are feminine:

• Chiave / Chiavi (key/s)
• Stazione / Stazioni (station/s)
• Ape / Api (bee/s)
• Stagione / Stagioni (season/s) 

As you can see these nouns all end with the vowel “I” in the plural form no matter what their gender is. 

3. Italian Nouns Ending in “I” and their Plural 

The next group of words is even easier: they end with the letter “I” and don’t change in the plural. They’re generally feminine and not very popular.

Here are some examples:

• Brindisi (toast) 
• Analisi (analysis)
• Ipotesi (theory)
• Crisi (crisis)

4. Plural when the Last Letter is: “O” 

In Italian, the words ending with the letter “o” are generally masculine. To turn them to plural, you just need to change the “O” to an “I”.

However, if the name is feminine things are different: in the plural form, they can get an “I” or keep the “O”. Generally the second option is the most likely. That means their singular and plural forms are the same. Let’s see some examples.

Italian Words Ending in “O”: Examples in the Plural

If masculine, the nouns ending in “O” get an “I” in the plural, like in the following examples:

• Libro / Libri (book/s) 
• Negozio / Negozi (shop/s)
• Bacio/ Baci (kiss/es)
• Gatto / Gatti (cat/s)

In the feminine, they can also change the “O” to an “I”, as in the word “mano” (hand) that becomes: “mani”. However, these names are quite rare. In general, feminine names ending in “O” don’t change in the plural form. In other words, they end in “O” both in the singular and in the plural, like in the examples below:

• Foto/ Foto (photo/s)
• Metro / Metro (underground)
• Moto / Moto (moto/s)

5. Nouns Ending in “CA”/”GA” & their Plural 

Let’s move on to the group of words that end in “CA” or “GA”. These nouns are mostly feminine and keep the hard sound in the plural. Therefore you write them with the letter “H” in between the C/G and the vowel. Put differently, if the name is masculine (less common), its plural ends in “CHI“/”GHI“; whereas the word finishes in “CHE“/”GHE” when feminine. Look at the examples below.

Plural of Names that end in “CA/GA” (Examples)

As mentioned before, these names are typically feminine, but “collega” is a common masculine word in this category. It’s use to refer to a male colleague/co-worker. In the plural, “collega” becomes: “colleghi“.

These are instead some feminine nouns (there are plenty more):

• Mucca / Mucche (cow/s) 
• Amica / Amiche (female friend/s)
• Tartaruga / Tartarughe (turtle/s)
• Collega / Colleghe (female colleague/s)

6. Italian Nouns Ending in “CO”/”GO” (Plural)  

The words ending in “CO” or “GO” are only masculine. In the plural, they can keep the hard sound (as seen before) and end in “CHI”/”GHI”; or they can get a soft sound, and end in “CI”/”GI”. Check out the examples below. 

Plural of Nouns Ending in “CO”/”GO” (Examples)

Here you go some examples of names that belong to this group and keep the hard sound:     

• Gioco / Giochi (game/s) 
• Bosco / Boschi (wood/s)
• Lago / Laghi (lake/s)
• Albergo / Alberghi (hotel/s)

These words, instead, get a soft sound and end in “CI/GI”:

• Amico / Amici (male friend/s)
• Medico / Medici (doctor/s)
• Psicologo / Psicologi (psychologist/s)
• Asparago / Asparagi (asparagus)

7. Words with an Accent (Plural)

Let’s have a look at the words where the last letter (always a vowel) has an accent. The plural of these nouns is very simple as it’s same as the singular. So basically you don’t have to change anything. Here you are some examples of masculine nouns:

• menù (menu)
• caffè (coffee)
• papà (daddy)
• lunedì (Monday)

These words, instead, are feminine:

• città (city)
• età (age)
• novità (news)
• verità (truth)

As you can see neither of the above names change in the plural form.

8. Italian Words Ending with a Consonant 

Lastly, it’s rare but some words in Italian can end with a consonant and they’re usually from a foreign language. These nouns don’t change in the plural form.

Below you can see some examples (they’re all masculine): 

• bar (coffee shop)
• computer 
• hotel 
• sport 

Exceptions (Plural in Italian)

As I said, the previous rules were only generic guidelines that can help you to approach the plural in Italian. However for every rules there are always exceptions.

So let’s see some words that don’t fall in any of the previous categories. The first ones have irregularities in the plural form while the second have no plural at all. Let’s look into them more in details.

1. Words with an Irregular Plural  

In Italian there are some words with an irregular plural form. In other words, you can’t use the previous rules to guess how the end in the plural but you must know it by heart. Below I’ve listed the most common ones:

• uomo / uomini (man/men)
• braccio / braccia (arm/s)
• uovo / uova (egg/s)
• dito / dita (finger/s)

2. Words with No Plural  

Another group of words that it’s worth to mention are the ones with no plural form. In Italian we call them “difettivi del plurale” as they’re always used only in the singular form. In the video below I split them into groups to make it easier to remember. Watch the lesson to find out more.

And this concludes our lesson on the plural of Italian nouns. To better understand what we’ve covered today, read also my lessons about the word gender in Italian and the articles (definite and indefinite): 

• WORD GENDER IN ITALIAN: A SIMPLE GUIDE 
• 7 DIFFERENT WAYS TO SAY THE ARTICLE “THE” IN ITALIAN