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How do you know the gender of Spanish nouns?

By: Natalia Molina Ceballos Thu Sep 18 2025

To know the of Spanish nouns, take a look at the ending or the gender of the before it. It is important to identify the gender of Spanish nouns because the and other words accompanying them agree accordingly. Take, for example, the feminine noun casa(house). If we want to add an adjective to describe it, we need to make it feminine as well, like this: casa bonita(beautiful house). This post will review how to recognize the gender of animate and inanimate nouns and review misleading nouns’ gender, nouns that change meaning based on gender, and nouns referring to animals. Keep reading to learn more!

How do you recognize gender in Spanish nouns?

To recognize gender in Spanish nouns, examine the ending of the noun: most nouns ending in -o are masculine (hermano(brother); libro(book)), and those ending in -a are feminine (hermana(sister); taza(cup)). Although this is a good starting point, this is not always the case, you can also memorize the various ending patterns (listed below) for nouns referring to inanimate objects.

Gender of nouns referring to animate objects (physical gender)

To identify the gender of a noun in Spanish, take a look at its ending. The general rule says that nouns ending in -a are feminine and those ending in -o are masculine. Look at the examples below:

Masculine
Feminine

niño

boy

niña

girl

Sometimes the masculine noun referring to an animate object ends in a , for example pintor(painter). In that case, make the noun feminine simply by adding an -a:

  • pintor → pintora

    painter

  • japonés → japonésa

    Japanese

  • campeón → campeóna

    champion

Let’s take a look at other cases of the gender of nouns that refer to animate objects.

Nouns that remain the same and only change the article

Some nouns in Spanish are the same regardless of gender and only change the article. This means they have a singular form for both feminine and masculine, while only the article changes. Look at the following examples:

Masculine
Feminine
Translation

el artista

la artista

the artist

el piloto

la piloto

the pilot

el paciente

la paciente

the patient

el estudiante

la estudiante

the student

el intérprete

la intérprete

the interpreter

Nouns ending in '–e'

There are a few nouns that end in -e in their masculine form that refer to animate objects. For these cases, the feminine form is made by dropping the -e and adding an -a:

Masculine
Feminine
Translation

el hefe

la hefa

the boss

el sastre

la sastra

the tailor

Nouns that change slightly for feminine and masculine forms

For some nouns, masculine and feminine forms are somewhat different:

Masculine
Translation
Feminine
Translation

el rey

the king

la reina

the queen

el actor

the actor

la actriz

the actress

el alcade

the mayor

la alcadesa

the mayor

Gender of nouns referring to inanimate objects

For the gender of nouns referring to inanimate objects, such as things, places, ideas, etc, the rules are different. Here are some rules and endings that will help you identify their gender with ease.

Masculine nouns

Nouns ending in the consonants -n, -r, -s, -l, -x and -y are usually masculine* (scroll down to see exceptions in the “Misleading nouns” section).

Noun
Ending
Example
Translation

-n

un / el corazón

a / the heart

-r

un / el amor

a / the love

-s

un / el bus

a / the bus

-l

un / el árbol

a / the tree

-x

un / el tórax

a / the thorax

-y

un / el buey

a / the ox

There are also some categories of nouns that are always masculine. These are: the days of the week, colors, numbers, languages, the names of rivers, oceans, mountains, volcanoes, and compound nouns formed with a verb. You’ll find some examples in the following table:

Category
Example (Spanish)
Example (translation)

Days of the week

el lunes

Monday

Colors

el azul

blue

Numbers

el diez

ten

Languages

el español

Spanish

Rivers, oceans,
mountains, and volcanoes

  • el Amazonas

  • el Atlántico

  • el Aconcagua

  • el Cotopaxi

  • The Amazon

  • The Atlantic

  • The Aconcagua

  • The Cotopaxi

Compound nouns made from verbs

el sacacorchos

the corkscrew

Finally, there are some other noun endings that are typically an indication of masculine gender. These are: -aje, -ambre, -ate, -ete, -ote, and -miento. Take a look at the following examples:

Ending
Example (Spanish)
Example (translation)

-aje

el traje

the suit

-ambre

el hambre

the hunger

-ate

el escaparate

the wardrobe

-ete

el clarinete

the clarinet

-ote

el camarote

the bunk bed

-miento

el pimiento

the pepper

Feminine nouns

Nouns ending in -dad, -tad, -tud, -ión, -ez, -eza, -umbre, -is, -ia, -ie, and -ncia are usually feminine (scroll down to see exceptions in the “Misleading nouns” section).

Ending
Example
Translation

-dad

la solidaridad

the solidarity

-tad

la amistad

the friendship

-tud

la latitud

the latitude

-ión

la canción

the song

-ez

la timidez

the shyness

-eza

la belleza

the beauty

-umbre

la cumbre

the summit

the summit

-is

la crisis

the crisis

-ia

la gracia

the grace

-ie

la superficie

the surface

-ncia

la emergencia

the emergency

Nouns ending in ‘-e’

Nouns ending in -e can be masculine or feminine. There is no trick to remembering these, so to know their gender, always take a look at the article before it. In its singular form, a feminine noun will be accompanied by the articles la(the) or una(a, an) and the masculine noun will go with the articles el(the) or un(a, an).

Masculine
Feminine

el restaurante

the restaurant

la clase

the class

el cine

cinema

la noche

the night

If you want to practice, we have created an exercise for you and a list with the most common Spanish nouns ending in -e.

What are misleading nouns?

Misleading nouns are nouns that refer to inanimate objects that may have the ending of a specific gender but are actually the opposite gender. These nouns are exceptions to the rules above. Look at some examples in the following table:

Masculine
Feminine

el clima

weather, test

la catedral

cathedral

el dia

day

la foto

picture, photo

el idioma

language

la imagen

image

Do you want to know more? We have created an exercise that you can use to learn more misleading Spanish nouns.

Nouns that change meaning based on their gender

Spanish has some nouns that change their meanings based on their gender (meaning when they are used with feminine or masculine articles).

Masculine
Feminine

el Papa

the Pope

la papa

the potato

el capital

the investment

la capital

the capital city

Check out our list of Spanish nouns that change their meaning based on their gender.

Nouns referring to animals

Nouns referring to animals can be tricky in Spanish. They may only be in the masculine or the feminine gender or may even have different words depending on the gender. Check out this list for a quick reference about the different cases and words for animals based on their gender.

Summary

It’s important to identify the gender of nouns in Spanish so that they can agree with the adjectives and other words used to accompany them. To do so, there are some rules we need to remember. Let’s see what we’ve learned:

  • Nouns that refer to animate objects will generally have two forms, masculine and feminine, which will be easily identifiable by their endings (-o or -a).

  • Nouns ending in consonants like -n, -r, -s, -l, -x, or -y are typically masculine.

  • Nouns ending in -d, -ión, -ez, or -is are typically feminine.

  • Nouns that end in -e and misleading nouns are hard to tell, so always look at the article in front of the word.

If you want to practice these two last cases, we have created this exercise for you. Finally, if you want an easy way to remember some of these endings, this acronym might be helpful.

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