Our

How to spell our

3 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce our

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does our mean?

1. determinerBelonging to or associated with us, the speaker and one or more others.

Our in a sentence

• This is our family photograph.

• Our team won the championship.

• We're selling our old car.

• Our house has a red door.

• Welcome to our home.

Where does our come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This is one of the oldest words in English, descending directly from the Old English ūre, the possessive form of we. It traces back through the Proto-Germanic uns, the ancestor that also gave German unser and Dutch ons, and ultimately to a Proto-Indo-European root tied to the first-person plural. Because it has been native to the language for well over a thousand years, it never picked up a Latin or French spelling; the modern -our shape simply preserves the long history of the word. The trap for adult writers is purely about sound: our is a homophone of hour in most accents, and is easily slurred with are in rapid speech, so the confusion lives in the ear rather than in any irregular spelling.

How the word is built

• our (possessive form of we, from Old English ūre)

Words that sound like our

They sound the same but mean different things, so the meaning decides which spelling to write.

• hour: A period of sixty minutes, or a particular point in time during the day.