The Gender of Russian Nouns
In Russian, nouns have a gender — masculine, feminine, or neuter.
Knowing a noun’s gender helps you make other words in the sentence agree correctly; without it, your Russian can sound odd or unnatural.
In most cases, you can tell a noun’s gender from its ending in the nominative singular. Plural nouns, however, do not have a grammatical gender.
Here are the common endings and patterns to help you recognise each gender.
Мужской род (Masculine Nouns)
Masculine nouns typically have:
- zero ending: телефон▯ (telephone), день▯ (day), чай▯ (tea)
- -а, -я endings for animate nouns referring to males: мужчина (man), папа (dad), дядя (uncle)
💡 Note: Nouns with a zero ending (▯) finish in a consonant or 'ь' in the nominative singular.
💡 Advanced point: When masculine nouns take certain suffixes — -ищ-,-ишк-,-ушк-,-ин-, they remain masculine even if their ending looks feminine or neuter.
Examples:
дом▯ (house) → домина (a big house) — still masculine, despite the -a ending
дом▯ (house) → домишко (a small house) — still masculine, despite the -o ending
This matters because gender affects how other parts of speech agree with the noun:
❌ новое домишко
✅ новый домишко (new small house) — the adjective agrees with the masculine noun
❌ Вон какая домина!
✅ Вон какой домина! (Look at that big house!) — the adjective agrees with the masculine noun
Женский род (Feminine Nouns)
Feminine nouns often end in:
- -а, -я: книга (book), подруга (female friend), неделя (week)
- zero ending: ночь▯ (night), вещь▯ (thing), любовь▯ (love)
Средний род (Neuter Nouns)
Neuter nouns usually end in:
- -о, -е: слово (word), яблоко (apple), море (sea)
- -мя: имя (name), время (time), пламя (flame)
- дитя (an old word for child; now sometimes used to describe a naive or inexperienced person)
Общий род (Common-Gender Nouns)
Some nouns can refer to people of either sex, that’s why they are called common-gender nouns. In such cases, the gender is determined by the words that agree with the noun.
Examples:
наш▯/наша коллега (our colleague [masc./fem.])
бедный/бедная сирота (poor orphan [masc./fem.])
Какой/Какая же ты обжора! (What a glutton you are! [masc./fem.])
Why Gender Matters
Knowing the gender of a noun is fundamental to speaking Russian correctly. It influences the endings of:
- Adjectives: дорогой телефон (expensive telephone) — the adjective agrees with the masculine noun
- Pronouns: твоя книга (your book) — the possessive pronoun agrees with the feminine noun
- Numerals: второе яблоко (second apple) — the ordinal numeral agrees with the neuter noun
- Participles: уставший мужчина (tired man) — the participle agrees with the masculine noun
- Past tense verbs:
- Мама приготовила обед. (Mom cooked lunch.) — the past tense verb agrees with the feminine noun
- Папа приготовил▯ обед. (Dad cooked lunch.) — the past tense verb agrees with the masculine noun
- Солнце взошло. (The sun rose.) — the past tense verb agrees with the neuter noun
Always check a noun’s gender in a dictionary if you are unsure.