Plurals

English Nouns and Plurals
A noun refers to a person, place, or thing.
Doctor
Church
Assistance
Newcastle
David
Mary


A noun can be singular or plural. A singular noun is one of something and a plural noun is two or more.
General Rule: In English, the plural form of most nouns is formed by adding -s to the singular form.
book - books
idea - ideas
toy - toys
village - villages
choice - choices


Exceptions:
Nouns ending in -s, -x, -sh, or -ch form the plural by adding -es.
lens - lenses
kiss - kisses
tax - taxes
dish - dishes
church - churches
Note: When the plural requires -es another syllable is added to the noun. For example, the word book and its plural books each have one syllable. But the word dish has one syllable while the plural dishes has two syllables.


Singular nouns ending in -y preceded by a consonant change the -y to -i and adding -es.
city - cities
lady - ladies
baby - babies
fly - flies
itinerary - itineraries

Note that nouns ending in -y preceded by a vowel form the plural by adding -s, like the general rule.

Singular nouns ending in -o preceded by a consonant generally form the plural by adding -es.
hero - heroes
potato - potatoes
zero - zeroes
Note: In this case, the number of syllables doesn't change.

Some exceptions:
halo - halos
kilo - kilos
piano - pianos
taco - tacos

Singular nouns ending in -f or -fe generally form the plural by changing the -f to -v and adding -s or -es.
leaf - leaves
thief - thieves
knife - knives
wife - wives

Nouns that have -oo often become -ee in the plural.
tooth - teeth
foot - feet
goose - geese

Nouns that end in -us become plural by changing to -i.
cactus - cacti
radius - radii
focus - foci

Finally, here are three important irregular plurals that we use a lot.
child - children
woman - women
man - men