What Are the Common Forms and Uses of Regular and Irregular Plural Nouns?

English is a phenomenal language with certain regular and irregular plural noun rules.

Regular Plural Nouns

A plural noun is the opposite of a singular noun. It represents that there is more than one noun. Regular forms of these are words that can be created by adding suffixes -s, -es at the end of singular words.

For Example Dog-Dogs (P), Catch-Catches (P)

Irregular Plural Nouns

Irregular forms of these parts of speech do not follow the standard adding suffixes -s, -es approach to make words multiples. Rather they follow exceptional patterns of changing spellings to make the plural form of the word. These word forms often requires extensive reading and speaking to memorize the words.

For Example Men (P) not mans, Hair (Singular)-Hair (non-countable noun - P), Foot (Singular)-Feet (P)

Forms and Uses Of Regular and Irregular Plural Nouns

Regular Plural Nouns Rules

Noun Ending with s, z, and x

Add the suffixes "-es" in the nouns end to make it in the plural form.

Bless-Blesses

Dish-Dishes

Noun Ending with Ch with "K" sound

Add Suffix" -s" when the noun ends up with the K sound

Stomach- Stomachs

Noun With Vowel(a, e, I, o, u) or "Y" ending

Eliminate Y and Add "-i" and then add "-es"

Baby- Babies

Trophy-Trophies

Non-Irregular Noun

Simply add suffix"-s" at the end of the word.

Cat-Cats

Lion-Lions

Irregular Plural Nouns Rules

Change Noun with "-f and -fe"

Replace the "-f or -fe" syllabus and add with"-ves"

Knife- Knives

Life-Lives

Change Noun's Vowel (a, e, I, o, u)

Make the plural form by altering the vowel

Foot-feet

Woman-women

Latin/Greek Nouns

Latin /Greek words can be turned into plurals by making particular changes

"Is" replaced by "-es" E.g. Crisis-Crises

"-us" replaced by "-i" E.g. Nucleus- Nuclei

"um" replaced by "-a" E.g. Curriculum-Curricula

Add "-r or -en" in noun

It likes uncommon but few examples are mentioned below

Child-Children

Ox- Oxen

Un-countable Noun

The noun which is uncountable, their plural remains the same

Milk- Milk

Hair- Hair

What Are Irregular Plural Nouns?

In the English language, it is often considered easy to convert a singular noun to a plural noun. However, there are certain nouns that do not just become plural by adding an "es" in the end. They require a certain method to make them plural. These nouns are known as the irregular form. There are hundreds of these types of words. You will have to memorize their techniques by reading and speaking. Here are some common patterns of irregular plural nouns.

Nouns that end with "f" and "fe"

If the word is ending with the letter f, then you will have to add a "v" to replace the letter "f" and then add an "es" in the end. For example,
Calf - calves
leaf - leaves

If the word ends with the letters "fe", then you will replace the letter "f" with a "v" and just add an "s" at the end. For example,
Wife - wives
Knife - Knives
Life - lives

Nouns that end with "O"

Nouns that end with the letter "o" are made plural by adding an "es" at the end. However, there are some exceptions to this rule. Some words that are borrowed from other languages do not follow this rule like pianos, zeros, photos, etc. Other than that, most of the words ending with "o" are made plural by using this rule. For example,
Hero - heroes
Tomato - tomatoes
Potato - potatoes

Vowel changing irregular nouns

There are some nouns that are made plural by changing the vowels in them. You can change the vowel "oo" to "ee" or turn "an" to "en". For example,
Man - men
Woman - women
tooth - teeth
foot - feet

Irregular Nouns that do not change

There are some words that do not change at all. These words can be used as they are in both singular and plural cases. For example,
fish
sheep
swine
trout
deer
moose

High Frequency Plural Noun Spelling Rules

Plural nouns are very high frequency words. They are used so often that it is important that we understand the mechanics behind spelling them properly. In most cases when we want to convert a noun from its singular form to a plural, we add an -s to the end of it. If you have a baseball and then buy ten more, you will have a collection of baseballs. Simple singular to plural transition examples:

- Calculator (singular), Calculators (plural)
- Pen (s), Pens (p)
- Computer (s), Computers (p)

This is all well and good, but what happens if a word already ends in the letter -s? For words that end in s, we convert the ending to -es. This holds not only true for words that end in -s, but also words that end in double s (-s), -sh, -ch, -x, and even -x. Some examples of convert singular nouns to plurals that end in -s:

- Bus (s), Buses (p)
- Lens (s), Lenses (p)
- Fox (s), Foxes (p)

There are some outliers in this group. In some special cases singular nouns that end in -s or -z, will require you to double those letters just before you add the -es to make it a plural.

- Gas (s), Gasses (p)
- Quiz (s), Quizzes (p)

Singular nouns that end in -(consonant)-y require you to add an -ies ending to make them plural.

- Candy (s), Candies (p)
- Puppy (s), Puppies (p)

When a singular noun ends in o, you add an -es to make it plural. Here is where all the spelling errors come up. Even a past vice president with an Ivy League education made this mistake. Remember the old tomato mishap, wait that was just a singular spelling error! Imagine if he had to make it a plural. Here are some examples of this in action:

- Tomato (s), Tomatoes (p)
- Zero (s), Zeroes (p)

The last thing to keep in mind is that irregular forms of these are called that (irregular) for a reason they deviate from all traditional spelling norms. When working with those words it is best just to memorize the spelling of the words. One of the most commonly misunderstood irregular plural shifts comes from the singular word (woman). It shifts into the plural word women. This is often misspelled and completely at loss for English as a Second Language learners.