Plurals
One plural ending, -ler / -lar, and the first place you meet the machine that runs all of Turkish: vowel harmony. Learn it here and every later chapter is the same rule applied again.
Vowel harmony, pattern 1: two-way (e / a)
The suffix copies the frontness of the last vowel of the word:
| last vowel | suffix | examples |
|---|---|---|
| e i ö ü (front) | -ler | ev → evler, kedi → kediler, göz → gözler, gül → güller |
| a ı o u (back) | -lar | kitap → kitaplar, kız → kızlar, okul → okullar, kapı → kapılar |
Only the last vowel counts: arkadaş → arkadaşlar, öğretmen → öğretmenler. A few loans break the rule because their final consonant is "front": saat → saatler, rol → roller, gol → goller.
The same two-way choice decides -de/-da, -den/-dan, -e/-a, -me/-ma (negation), -ecek/-acak (future) and -se/-sa (if).
Vowel harmony, pattern 2: four-way (i / ı / ü / u)
Suffixes with a high vowel copy both frontness and rounding:
| last vowel | suffix vowel | accusative example |
|---|---|---|
| e i | i | ev → evi, kedi → kediyi |
| ö ü | ü | göz → gözü, gül → gülü |
| a ı | ı | kitap → kitabı, kapı → kapıyı |
| o u | u | okul → okulu, palto → paltoyu |
This one decides the accusative, the genitive, the possessive endings, the past -di, the question particle mi and the -iyor present. When a chapter writes a suffix with i, read it as "i, ı, ü or u, whichever fits".
The buffer letters
Turkish avoids two vowels touching across a suffix boundary, and slips in a consonant:
| buffer | where | example |
|---|---|---|
| y | most vowel endings after a vowel | kapıyı, arabaya, hastayım |
| n | genitive, and case endings after a 3rd-person possessive | arabanın, evinde "in his house" |
| s | 3rd-person possessive after a vowel | arabası "his car", Türk kahvesi |
No plural after a number
A number, or any quantity word, already says "more than one", so the noun stays singular:
| Turkish | gloss |
|---|---|
| iki kitap | two books (✗ iki kitaplar) |
| üç kedi | three cats |
| çok insan | many people |
| birkaç gün | a few days |
| Kaç kişi? | How many people? |
Bazı "some" is the exception and takes the plural: bazı insanlar "some people".
What else -ler does
| use | example | gloss |
|---|---|---|
| plural on the verb | Geliyorlar. | They're coming. |
| a family or group | Ahmetler | Ahmet and his family / folks |
| "around" a time | saat beşlerde | around five o'clock |
| respect (formal, old-fashioned) | Müdür Bey geldiler. | The director has arrived. |
Stacking
The plural comes straight after the noun, before possession and case: kitap-lar-ım-da → kitaplarımda "in my books".
Against Korean and Japanese
Korean 들 is optional and mostly for people; Japanese has no plural ending at all for ordinary nouns. Turkish marks the plural as routinely as English does, and drops it exactly where Korean does — after a number. Hindi keeps the plural after numbers (do kitābẽ), so a Hindi speaker has to unlearn it.
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