3 Plurals and number agreement
3.1 Plural forms
3.1.1 Spanish nouns and adjectives form their plurals as follows:
Class 1. Singulars ending in an unstressed vowel add -s:la mesa‘table’ las mesas‘tables’
el banco‘bank’ los bancos‘banks’
valiente‘brave’ (sg.) valientes‘brave’ (pl.)
Class 2. Singulars ending in a consonant add -es:el lápiz‘pencil’ los lápices‘pencils’
inglés‘English’ (sg.) ingleses‘English’ (pl.)
el rey‘king’ los reyes‘kings’; ‘king and queen’
Class 3. There is some inconsistency with singulars ending in a stressed vowel: those
ending in -í add -es; those ending in other stressed vowels tend increasingly simply to
add -s, although some older words ending in -ú add -es:
iraní‘Iranian’ (sg.) iraníes‘Iranian’ (pl.)
el sofá‘sofa’ los sofás‘sofas’
el menú‘menu’ los menús‘menus’
el café‘café’ los cafés‘cafés’
el tabú‘taboo’ los tabúes‘taboos’Class 4. Singulars ending with -s in an unstressed syllable do not change in the plural:
el martes‘Tuesday’ los martes‘Tuesdays’Class 5. There is quite a lot of variation in the formation of the plural of foreign
words, and no hard and fast rule can be given. In particular, English loanwords
sometimes keep the English form of the plural, and Latin words ending in -m are
treated similarly:el córner‘corner’ (in football) los córners‘corners’
el referéndum‘referendum’ los referéndums
‘referendums’/‘referenda’
but those words which are very firmly established in the language are adapted to the
rules for Spanish words:el dólar‘dollar’ los dólares‘dollars’
el film‘film’ los filmes‘films’