Using possessive adjectives

Possessive adjectives – like other adjectives – are used to describe a noun in a sentence.

Most importantly – they describe who something belongs to.

Some common ones that you will see include, “my”, “your”, “his”, “her” and “our”. When using them, they
should always go before the noun.

Examples!
“My favourite colour is red.”
“Our holiday was cancelled.”
“He ate her food by mistake.”
Another important point to note is that adjectives do not have singular and plural versions – you use the same
for both!
For example: “Those are my books” and “this is my book” both use the same possessive adjective, “my”.

Using possessive pronouns

Possessive pronouns
While they also show ownership, they can be used in place of a noun, to avoid repeating it in a sentence.

Some common possessive pronouns that you might come across include, “mine”, “yours” “his”, “hers”, and
“ours”.

Possessive pronouns are used after the noun, unlike adjectives – and they cannot be used before the noun at
all.

Examples:
“This car is mine.”
“The tickets they took were actually ours.”
“The test results are hers.”
Like possessive adjectives, possessive pronouns are used in the same way for both single and plural nouns –
there are no different forms.

Don’t get them mixed up!

As both forms are used to describe ownership, you can choose whether or not to use an adjective or a
pronoun in a sentence, but you must be careful to make sure you have the right construction!
While they do look similar, possessive pronouns and possessive adjectives must not be mixed up, as this will
not be correct. For example, if you say:
“The car is mine” – this is correct. But you cannot say “This is mine car”. Instead, you would say, “this is my
car.”

It’s and its

Some possessive pronouns and adjectives are exactly the same – such as “its”. So how can you tell them
apart in this case?
The important thing to consider is the construction of a sentence. For example:
“This is its new home” – in this example, “its” is before the noun, so it must be an adjective. If the sentence had
it after the noun, it would be a pronoun.
Another common mistake is mixing up “it’s” for “its”. “It’s” is actually a contraction of the phrase “it is” or “it has”,
and cannot be used in the same way! While they sound completely the same, in written English you should
always check that you have the correct form.

Person Pronoun Adjective

1st singular mine my

2nd yours your

3rd (female) hers her

3rd (male) His his

3rd (neutral) Its its

1st plural ours our

3rd plural theirs their

1. Excuse me, those are ____________seats. ( we )

2. Has the cat had __its_________ food? ( it )

3. Have you got __your________ mobile, or would you like to borrow _mine__________? ( you/I )

4. I don’t think it’s _your____________ apartment. I think it’s _theirs___________. ( you/they )

5. I think this is __my_______ newspaper. Oh no, it’s ____yours__________. ( I / you )

6. Is it ___your______ briefcase or ______his_______? ( you/he )

7. ___their______ garden is smaller than _____ours__________ . ( they/we )

8. The police asked ___me__________ for my address. ( I )

9. They’re not __my______ keys – they’re ___hers______his_________. ( I/she he )

9. Whose car is this? Is it __yours?_______ ? ( you )