Mothers or Mother’s or Mothers’?(English Grammar Explained)

Grammar / By

Mothers is the plural for mother. Mother’s is the singular possessive form of mother. Mothers’ is the plural possessive form of mothers. 

Mothers or Mother’s or Mothers’ are all pronounced the same way.

Mothers

We use Mothers when we want to make the word “mother” plural.

So it is:

I have one Mother.

I have two Mothers. 

Mother’s 

Mother’s is the possessive form of mother. We use the possessive form of Mother when we want to show that one Mother owns something.

This is my Mother’s house.

We need to look after our Mother’s plant.

Remember we are talking about only one mother. You can replace mother’s with a name if that makes it easier to understand.

This is Jane’s house.

We need to look after Mary’s plant.

Mothers’ 

Mothers’ is the possessive form of Mothers. When the noun already ends in “s” and we want to make the word possessive, we need to put the apostrophe after the “s”.

It is time for the weekly Mothers’ meeting.

In this case, there are many mothers involved.

In spoken English, it can be difficult to know whether you are talking about one mother or many Mothers in the possessive because mother’s and mothers’ sound exactly the same.

Is it Mothers Day, Mother’s Day or Mothers’ Day?

Mothers Day is incorrect. We need to use the possessive form of mother because the day belongs to Mother. Both mother’s day and mothers’ day are possible depending if you are talking about one mother or many mothers.

When sending a greeting to my mother I would use “Happy Mother’s day” but if I am referring to the day in general I would use “Happy Mothers’ day”.  

What is the difference between Mother’s and Mothers?

Mothers is simply the plural of the word Mother. Mother’s is the singular possessive of Mother which means that your Mother owns something.

Is Mother’s plural?

No, “Mother’s” is not plural. It is the possessive form of Mother. “Mothers” is the plural of “Mother”.

Conor
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