The Two Genders of Italian Nouns

💡In Italian, most nouns have one of the following three endings in the singular.
These first two rules will give you good and clear pointers:

Nouns that end in “-o” in the singular are usually masculine.

💬 Examples:
il ragazzo ‒ the boy
l'albero ‒ the tree
il libro ‒ the book

Nouns that end in “-a” in the singular are usually feminine.

💬 Examples:
la ragazza ‒ the girl
la casa ‒ the house
la lettera ‒ the letter

Only the third group of nouns might put you in a pickle.
Nouns that end in “-e” or “-è” in the singular can be masculine or feminine.
So, in this case, it would be best to always learn the noun together with the article.
This way, you will always know the gender of the word.

💬 Examples:
il pesce (m) ‒ the fish
il pane (m) ‒ the bread
il caffè (m) ‒ the coffee
la torre (f) ‒ the tower
la notte (f) ‒ the night

➠ Formation of the Plurals