Dutch Plural Exceptions: The Irregular Plurals You Must Know | A2 Dutch, Lesson 20

Welcome to lesson twenty of the A2 Dutch Grammar Course. In this lesson you will review Dutch plural formation and focus on the exceptions — the patterns that are easy to get wrong. Most Dutch nouns form their plural by adding -en. Some add -s. And some add -'s with an apostrophe. On top of that, spelling often changes when you add the ending — vowels drop, consonants double, and f becomes v or s becomes z. By the end of this lesson you will know exactly which pattern to use.

Drie manieren — -en, -s, of -'s

Dutch plurals use one of three endings. The default is -en — most Dutch nouns take this. Boek — boeken. Arm — armen. Kaart — kaarten. The second option is -s. Words with two or more syllables ending in -el, -em, -en, -er, -e, or -je take -s instead of -en. Winkel — winkels. Bodem — bodems. Dokter — dokters. Meisje — meisjes. Tante — tantes. The third option is -'s with an apostrophe. This applies when the word ends in a, i, o, u, or y. Foto — foto's. Baby — baby's. Menu — menu's. -en is the most common ending, but the -s and -'s patterns are very frequent too — make sure you learn them carefully.

Spellingregels — wat verandert er bij -en?

When you add -en to form the plural, the spelling sometimes changes to preserve the pronunciation. The first rule applies to short vowels: if the singular has one vowel followed by one consonant, you double the consonant. Lip — lippen. Bed — bedden. Pan — pannen. Without the double consonant, the vowel would become long — bed-en would sound like beden, which is wrong. The second rule applies to long vowels: Dutch writes long vowels as double letters in a closed syllable — raam, been, oog. But when you add -en, the syllable opens and one vowel letter is dropped. Raam — ramen. Been — benen. Oog — ogen. Muur — muren. The vowel stays long — the spelling just becomes shorter because the open syllable does not need two vowel letters.

f → v en s → z

There is one more spelling change to watch out for. Many common words ending in -f or -s after a vowel change their final consonant in the plural. F becomes v. Brief — brieven. Neef — neven. S becomes z. Huis — huizen. Muis — muizen. Roos — rozen. After the consonant changes, you simply add -en as normal. The reason is that Dutch does not write the voiced sound v at the end of a word — that position always uses f. But in the middle of a word, before a vowel, the voiced v is written and heard. So when you add -en, the consonant often shifts. The same logic applies to s and z.

De apostrof — wanneer schrijf je -'s?

When a word ends in one of the vowels a, i, o, u, or y, the plural takes -'s with an apostrophe. Foto — foto's. Taxi — taxi's. Baby — baby's. Menu — menu's. The apostrophe shows that the -s does not belong to the stem but is a separate plural ending. Without it, words like fotos or babys would be confusing to read and pronounce. Abbreviations follow the same rule: wc — wc's, tv — tv's. There is one exception: when the word already ends in two or more vowels, you simply add -s without an apostrophe. Cadeau — cadeaus. Not cadeau's — just cadeaus.

Onregelmatige meervouden — onthoud deze!

A small number of Dutch nouns form their plural in a way that follows no rule — you simply have to memorise them. Kind — kinderen. Ei — eieren. Koe — koeien. Stad — steden. These forms appear frequently in everyday Dutch, so they are worth learning well. There is one rule that holds for all plural nouns without exception: every plural noun in Dutch uses the article de — not het. It does not matter whether the singular is a de-word or a het-word. Het kind — de kinderen. Het ei — de eieren. In the plural, every noun becomes a de-word.

Wat heb je geleerd?

Let's review. Dutch plurals use three endings: -en for most words, -s for multi-syllable words ending in -el, -em, -en, -er, -e, or -je, and -'s for words ending in a, i, o, u, or y. When adding -en, three spelling changes can happen: a short vowel with one consonant doubles the consonant, a long double vowel drops one letter, and final -f or -s often changes to -v or -z. A few plurals are irregular — kind becomes kinderen, ei becomes eieren, stad becomes steden. And always remember: every plural noun in Dutch takes the article de, regardless of whether the singular is a de-word or a het-word.

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