Learn Gender In Spanish With Ultimate Spanish Grammar Guide
Generally speaking, you can immediately tell a noun’s gender in Spanish, just by looking at its ending.
But there are some important exceptions that you have to pay attention to! Spring Spanish (one of my side projects) made a useful video about this topic. Here’s how you can easily remember gender in Spanish:
For example, “el libro” (the book) is masculine, and “la casa” (the house) is feminine. Easy enough, right?
But then you’ve got words like “el día” (the day) which is masculine despite ending in -a, or “la mano” (the hand) which is feminine even though it ends in -o.
Sneaky, right? Let’s explore this topic together!
1. How to tell a noun’s gender in Spanish?
Effortless Answers
Spanish grammatical gender is easy, but important in the language. Spanish nouns are either masculine or feminine. The grammatical gender applies to nouns, adjectives, and some pronouns.
Most masculine nouns end in -o (gato – cat, libro – book). There are some Spanish nouns that refer to male people or animals which are masculine – these also have masculine gender (hombre – man, toro – bull)
Most feminine nouns end in -a (gata – female cat, mesa – table). There are Spanish nouns that refer to female people or animals which are feminine (mujer – woman, vaca – cow).
2. Masculine noun gender in Spanish
So, we mentioned earlier that the masculine noun gender in Spanish usually end with an -o.
Here’s a table with common masculine nouns in Spanish that follow this pattern:
| Spanish | English |
|---|---|
| el libro | the book |
| el perro | the dog |
| el carro | the car |
| el plato | the plate |
| el vaso | the glass |
| el zapato | the shoe |
| el banco | the bank/bench |
| el cuaderno | the notebook |
| el queso | the cheese |
| el ojo | the eye |
| el dedo | the finger |
| el pelo | the hair |
| el huevo | the egg |
| el fuego | the fire |
| el sombrero | the hat |
Words ending in -ma, -pa, and -ta are often masculine, too, even though they sometimes end in -a.
This is one of those quirks in Spanish that can trip up learners, but once you know it, it’s super helpful.
Let’s take a look at some common examples:
| Spanish | English |
|---|---|
| el problema | the problem |
| el tema | the theme/topic |
| el sistema | the system |
| el idioma | the language |
| el clima | the climate |
| el drama | the drama |
| el mapa | the map |
| el papa | the pope |
| el sofá | the sofa |
| el planeta | the planet |
| el cometa | the comet |
| el poeta | the poet |
| el atleta | the athlete |
| el pirata | the pirate |
| el profeta | the prophet |
3. Female Spanish gender nouns
Now, let’s take a look at some common feminine nouns in Spanish that end in -a.
This pattern is just as important as the masculine -o ending we just covered.
Here’s a table with some great examples:
| Spanish | English |
|---|---|
| la casa | the house |
| la mesa | the table |
| la silla | the chair |
| la cama | the bed |
| la puerta | the door |
| la ventana | the window |
| la escuela | the school |
| la comida | the food |
| la bebida | the drink |
| la camisa | the shirt |
| la falda | the skirt |
| la pelota | the ball |
| la playa | the beach |
| la luna | the moon |
| la estrella | the star |
Words ending in -ción, -sión, -dad, and -tad are usually also feminine in Spanish.
These are really useful patterns to know because they cover a lot of common, often abstract nouns. Let’s check out some examples here too:
| Spanish | English |
|---|---|
| la canción | the song |
| la información | the information |
| la educación | the education |
| la televisión | the television |
| la decisión | the decision |
| la pasión | the passion |
| la ciudad | the city |
| la verdad | the truth |
| la libertad | the freedom |
| la felicidad | the happiness |
| la universidad | the university |
| la posibilidad | the possibility |
| la imaginación | the imagination |
| la admiración | the admiration |
| la amistad | the friendship |
4. Spanish gender rules with definite articles
Now, the next concept allows the Spanish language to be more gender-inclusive, as the same word can refer to people of any gender.
Some nouns in Spanish can be either masculine or feminine, and their gender is determined by the definite article used with them.
This usually happens when the noun refers to a person and can change based on whether you’re talking about a man or a woman.
These nouns are all about professions, nationalities, or personal characteristics. The noun itself doesn’t change, but the article (and any accompanying adjectives) does change to match the gender of the person being referred to.
Let’s explain this with some examples in a table:
| Spanish | English |
|---|---|
| el/la artista | the artist |
| el/la estudiante | the student |
| el/la dentista | the dentist |
| el/la periodista | the journalist |
| el/la turista | the tourist |
| el/la pianista | the pianist |
| el/la modelo | the model |
| el/la testigo | the witness |
| el/la joven | the young person |
| el/la paciente | the patient |
| el/la cantante | the singer |
| el/la policía | the police officer |
| el/la atleta | the athlete |
| el/la especialista | the specialist |
| el/la cliente | the client |
For example, if you’re talking about a male artist, you’d say “el artista,” but for a female artist, you’d say “la artista.” The word “artista” doesn’t change, but the article does.
5. Plural of nouns in Spanish
Making Spanish nouns plural is pretty easy. For most nouns, you just add an -s or -es to the end.
Here’s how:
- If a noun ends in a vowel, you typically just add -s. So “el libro” becomes “los libros” (the books), and “la casa” becomes “las casas” (the houses).
- For nouns ending in a consonant, you usually add -es. For example, “el árbol” becomes “los árboles” (the trees), and “la flor” becomes “las flores” (the flowers).
Now, here’s a cool thing: when you make a noun plural, its gender doesn’t change.
A masculine noun stays masculine, and a feminine noun stays feminine. The only thing that changes is the article: “el” becomes “los” for masculine plurals, and “la” becomes “las” for feminine plurals.
There are a few tricky cases, like words ending in -z (which change to -ces in plural), or some words that don’t change at all in plural form.
But don’t worry too much about these exceptions right now, you have plenty of time to learn them later.
6. Practice worksheet for gender in Spanish
Fill in the blanks with the correct article!
We have more to offer! Sign up now, and you’ll get access to our Full Practice Worksheet Library:
7. Learn common gender rules naturally with Conversation Based Chunking
Since you know these rules about gender in Spanish, you can start to learn all of the phrases connected to this topic.
One method that can speed up this process is Conversation Based Chunking. This approach focuses on the natural building blocks of the language, so instead of just repeating the words from these tables, you use lexical chunks in the natural habitat: Spanish sentences.
With this method, you internalize the correct usage of the boring grammar rules, too, so you don’t have to spend too much time on remembering them every time you speak Spanish.
To help you on this language learning journey, we can offer you a FREE Spanish Chunking Starter Pack, which will explain the method, give you chunking lists and other resources to learn Spanish.
