Ours

How to spell ours

4 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce ours

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does ours mean?

1. pronounA possessive pronoun used to indicate something belonging to us, standing in place of a noun.

Ours in a sentence

• The house on the corner is ours, bought two years ago.

• Their garden is bigger, but ours gets more sunlight.

Where does ours come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This is a native English word with deep Germanic roots. It descends from Old English ure, the possessive form of we, which in turn traces back to a Proto-Germanic ancestor that also gave German unser and Dutch ons. The final s was added during the Middle English period to create an independent or absolute possessive form, one that stands alone without a following noun, paralleling forms like yours, hers, and theirs. There is no apostrophe in ours, even though the s might tempt one, because it is a pronoun and not a contraction or a regular noun possessive. That missing apostrophe is the single most common writing trap for an adult, since the eye expects 'our's' by analogy with everyday noun possessives.

How the word is built

• our (first-person plural possessive)
• -s (absolute possessive marker)