Russian Noun Gender: Masculine, Feminine and Neuter

Every Russian noun has a gender: masculine, feminine or neuter. You can usually tell from the ending.

The usual endings

Gender	Typical ending	Examples
Masculine	a hard consonant, -й or -ь	стол (table), музей (museum), день (day)
Feminine	-а, -я or -ь	книга (book), неделя (week), дверь (door)
Neuter	-о, -е or -мя	окно (window), море (sea), имя (name)

The soft sign puzzle

A noun ending in -ь can be masculine or feminine, so learn it with each word.

• день (day) is masculine.
• ночь (night) is feminine.
• дверь (door) is feminine.
• словарь (dictionary) is masculine.

Exceptions

Some nouns are grammatically masculine but name people, so they follow the person:

• папа (dad)
• дедушка (grandfather)
• мужчина (man)

They end in -а, but take masculine adjectives and past tense: мой папа пришёл.

Why gender matters

Gender controls the form of adjectives, pronouns and past-tense verbs:

• новый дом, a new house (m)
• новая книга, a new book (f)
• новое окно, a new window (n)

Pronouns

• он (he) replaces masculine nouns.
• она (she) replaces feminine ones.
• оно (it) replaces neuter ones.

So стол is он, and книга is она.

Tips

1. Learn each noun with its gender.
2. Use the ending as a guide.
3. Use the dictionary to check gender, especially for -ь nouns.

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