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Russian Nouns Declension Russian grammar --> Russian Nouns Declension

In Russian, almost all nouns decline, i.e. change their endings to express a particular case. They decline according to certain patterns that form large groups called declensions. There a 3 declension types in Russian: first declension (I declension), second declension (II declension) and third declension (III declension). Some nouns of foreign origin, like кофе, меню, пальто are indeclinable, i.e. they have only one form for all cases.

Nouns distribution by declension types

It is possible to determine the declension type a noun belongs to taking into account grammatical gender of the noun and its nominative singular form. The general guidelines to determine the declension type of a noun are:

I declension includes:

- all masculine nouns, except nouns ending in –a/-я and the noun путь
- all neuter nouns, except nouns ending in -мя

II declension includes:

- all feminine nouns, except nouns ending in -ь
- masculine nouns ending in –a/-я

- feminine nouns ending in –ь
- neuter nouns ending in –мя
- masculine noun путь

Below, you will find the most frequent declension patterns for each type of declension. Notice that, in some cases forms, nouns may take particular endings, different from the endings presented in these patterns.

I DECLENSION

Masculine nouns