Join In Twitter YouTube Weekly Newsletter Libraries A-Z Grammatical Terms A-Z Confused Words A-Z Awkward Plurals Punctuation Lessons Common Mistakes
(ordered by seriousness) ESL Vocabulary Lists Parts of Speech Lists A-Z Idioms and Proverbs Tests and Games Top Tip Install a grammar checker
for your browser

Plural of Potato

by Craig Shrives

The Quick Answer

The plural of potato is potatoes.

The Plural of Potato

The plural of potato is potatoes.

Nearly a third of the world's potatoes were harvested in China and India.
Potatoes are used to brew alcoholic beverages such as vodka, potcheen, or akvavit.

The noun potato adheres to the standard rules for forming the plurals of nouns in English (shown in the table below).

Are You Good at Plurals?

Here's a quick test.

Getting ready...

The Standard Rules for Forming the Plurals

The table below shows the standard rules for forming the plurals of nouns in English.

Type	Example of Type	Forming the Plural	Plural
Most Nouns	lamp scythe	add s	lamps scythes
Noun Ending s, sh, ch, x or z	bus dress	add es	buses dresses
Nouns ending [consonant] o	potato zero	add either s or es (There are no rules for this - you have to know.)	potatoes zeros
Nouns ending [vowel] o	patio ratio	add s	patios ratios
Nouns ending [consonant] y	story penny	change the y to an i and add es	stories pennies
Nouns ending [vowel] y	storey () donkey	add s	storeys donkeys
Nouns ending f or fe	dwarf knife	ves and/or s (There are no rules - you have to know.)	dwarfs knives
Exceptions	man louse	some nouns undergo a vowel or letters change	men lice
More exceptions	salmon sheep	some nouns do not change at all	salmon sheep

Why Is There Confusion over the Plural of Potato?

There is confusion because the rule for forming plurals with nouns ending in o isn't straightforward. Most nouns will just add an s. For example:

Kangaroo becomes kangaroos.
Piano becomes pianos.

Some add es. For example:

Echo becomes echoes.
Torpedo becomes torpedoes.

With some words, both versions are accepted. For example:

Volcano becomes volcanoes or volcanos.
Halo becomes haloes or halos.

The plural of potato is always potatoes. Unfortunately, there is no clever way of knowing which nouns ending o follow which rules. You have to know. (For example, you have to know that potato becomes potatoes, but piano becomes pianos.)

Beware

Don't Use an Apostrophe to Form a Plural

Adding 's is never an option when forming the plural of a noun. Despite this simple rule, inexperienced writers often feel compelled to add an apostrophe, especially when the noun ends with a vowel (e.g., piano, tomato, emu). For example:

Mango's are low in calories.
Mangoes are low in calories.

Ready for the Test?

Help Us Improve Grammar Monster

Do you disagree with something on this page?
Did you spot a typo?

Find Us Quicker!

When using a search engine (e.g., Google, Bing), you will find Grammar Monster quicker if you add #gm to your search term.