Santas or Santa’s or Santas’ (English Grammar Explained)

Grammar / By

Santas is the plural for Santa. Santa’s is the singular possessive form of Santa. Santas’ is the plural possessive form of Santas. 

Santas or Santa’s or Santas’ are all pronounced the same way.

Santas

We use Santas when we want to make the word “Santa” plural.

So it is:

I need one Santa.

I need two Santas. 

Santa’s 

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

This is my Santa’s house.

We need to look after our Santa’s elves.

Remember we are talking about only one Santa. 

Santas’ 

Santas’ is the possessive form of Santas. When the noun already ends in “s” and we want to make the word possessive, we need to put the apostrophe after the “s”. In reality, there is only one Santa so this form is not very common.

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

Is it Santas Grotto or Santa’s Grotto?

Santa’s Grotto is correct because “Santa” is a possessive noun. 

Conor
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