What are the Italian indefinite articles? English has two: a and an. Italian has four.
Un anello
A ring
Uno specchio
A mirror
Una bottiglia
A bottle
Un’ascia
An axe
How and when do you use the indefinite articles in Italian? In this lesson, you will find an answer to all these questions.
Let’s start with the explanation right away!
Table of Contents
Indefinite articles in Italian
Italian indefinite articles are used to talk about a generic person or thing or groups of people/things and you will find them only in the singular.
All indefinite articles in Italian need to be placed before the noun. If there’s already an adjective before the noun, they are placed before that.
Un drago vola.
A dragon flies.
Una lepre salta.
A hare jumps.
Uno strano animale nuota.
A strange animal swims.
Italian indefinite articles can be either masculine or feminine depending on the gender of the noun they introduce.
If the noun is masculine, you have to introduce it with a masculine indefinite article. If the noun is feminine, you will need to introduce it with a feminine indefinite article.
Before diving into each kind of article, let’s write down all possible Italian indefinite articles in a table.
| Article | |
|---|---|
| Masculine | un, uno |
| Feminine | una, un’ |
Drago is a masculine noun, so we will need to use either un or uno as these are the masculine indefinite articles.
Which article do you have to choose between these two? It depends on the noun.
Find out why in the next section.
Masculine articles
As you can see in the table above, Italian has 2 masculine indefinite articles: UN and UNO.
You choose either depending on the beginning letter of the word following the article.
When to use “un”
UN is used before any masculine nouns or adjectives beginning with a vowel or a consonant. There are a few exceptions to this rule:
- s+consonant (st-, sp-, sb-, sv-, sc- etc.)
- “sh” sound (sci-, scia-, scio- etc.)
- z-, gn-, ps-, pn-, semivowel i and x–
For example, a masculine noun such as gatto, cat, will become un gatto, a cat, because it begins with a g- and this consonant is not featured in our exceptions.
Un gatto gioca.
A cat plays.
The same thing applies to many other nouns beginning with a consonant, such as topo, libro or divano.
Un topo squittisce.
A mouse squeaks.
Questo è un libro.
This is a book.
Vedo un divano.
I see a sofa.
Gestisco un hotel.
I manage a hotel.
Questo è un grande giorno.
This is a big day.
| Article | Noun |
|---|---|
| UN | gatto |
| UN | topo |
| UN | libro |
| UN | divano |
| UN | hotel |
| UN | grande giorno |
And of course, all masculine nouns and adjectives beginning with one of the fine Italian vowels: A, E, I, O and U.
Vedo un asino.
I see a donkey.
Un orso dorme.
A bear sleeps.
Un uccello cinguetta.
A bird chirps.
| Article | Noun |
|---|---|
| UN | asino |
| UN | orso |
| UN | uccello |
A noun like specchio, however, will not become un specchio as it begins with s+consonant (sp-), which is one of the exceptions to our rule. The same goes for scivolo (sh- sound), zaino (z) and pneumatico.
What’s up with these nouns? What article do we have to use? This is where “uno” comes into the picture.
When to use “uno”
UNO is used in front of any masculine nouns or adjectives beginning with:
- s+consonant (st-, sp-, sb-, sv-, sc- etc.)
- “sh” sound (sci-, scia-, scio- etc.)
- z-, gn-, ps-, pn-, semivowel i and x–
You got that right: these are the same exceptions to the “un” article!
That means specchio will become uno specchio. And yogurt, which is a word that begins with a semivowel (i/y/j+vowel), will become uno yogurt and so on.
Ho rotto uno specchio.
I broke a mirror.
Ho uno zaino rosso.
I have a red backpack.
Conosco uno psicologo.
I know a psychologist.
Mangio uno yogurt.
I eat a yogurt.
Questo è uno stretto passaggio.
This is a narrow pathway.
(Un passaggio —> Uno stretto passaggio)
You would normally say un passaggio because passaggio begins with a p-, but we’ve seen that for any of the Italian indefinite articles you have to take into account the beginning letters of any word directly following the article.
Stretto, narrow, begins with s+consonant. An adjective is still a word, right? 😉
If there’s an adjective before a noun, you’ll have to consider the beginning letter of the adjective itself, not the beginning letter of the noun.
This is why we say: Un passaggio and uno stretto passaggio.
| Article | Noun |
|---|---|
| UNO | specchio |
| UNO | zaino |
| UNO | psicologo |
| UNO | yogurt |
| UNO | stretto passaggio |
All clear? Tutto chiaro? Perfetto! Now let’s see how the Italian feminine indefinite articles work.
Feminine articles
The indefinite articles in Italian for feminine nouns are easy to learn. Again, there’s only two of them: UNA and UN’.
When to use “una”
UNA is used for any feminine nouns or adjectives beginning with:
- a consonant
- semivowel i/y/j
- h
- w
For example, a feminine noun such as lampada, lamp, will become una lampada, a lamp.
Compro una lampada.
I buy a lamp.
The noun iena translates to hyena and it begins with a semivowel i+vowel. So we’ll say una iena.
You don’t say: un’iena. It sounds hideous!
Una iena ride.
A hyena laughs.
Hall is feminine, so we’ll say una hall.
L’hotel ha una hall gigantesca.
The hotel has a huge hall.
And so forth for all other consonants: sedia, coperta, porta.
Mi siedo su una sedia.
I sit on a chair.
Mi serve una coperta.
I need a blanket.
Sono davanti a una porta.
I’m in front of a door.
| Article | Noun |
|---|---|
| UNA | lampada |
| UNA | iena |
| UNA | hall |
| UNA | sedia |
| UNA | coperta |
| UNA | porta |
Now let’s see when you use un’, which is basically the contracted form of una.
When to use “un’ “
UN’ is used in front of any feminine nouns or adjectives beginning with… you guessed it again, a vowel.
Always remember that the semivowel i/y/j behaves like a consonant!
Let’s see a few examples with A, E, I, O and U.
Un’arancia
An orange
Un’epoca
An age
Un’isola
An island
Un’orma
A footprint
Un’unghia
A nail
Una migliore amica
A best female friend
(Un’amica –> Una migliore amica)
| Article | Noun |
|---|---|
| UN’ | arancia |
| UN’ | epoca |
| UN’ | isola |
| UN’ | orma |
| UN’ | unghia |
| UNA | migliore amica |
In academic writing, una is sometimes used even before nouns beginning with a vowel.
Una amica, una epica, una isola.
In everyday language, stick to un’.
NEVER use un’ in front of a masculine noun or adjective beginning with a vowel.
Un amico, un elefante, un orco.
It’s never un’amico, un’elefante, un’orco.
Phew! We saw all types of Italian indefinite articles!
But knowing what articles are there is not that useful if you don’t know when to use them in a sentence. Do all nouns that are addressing a generic person or thing need an indefinite article, or can they do without it?
Keep reading and you’ll find out!
When to use the Italian indefinite articles
We already said that indefinite articles in Italian are used with a generic person or thing. Let me elaborate a bit more on this.
You use Italian indefinite articles to talk about things that haven’t been mentioned before.
Una bambina giocava in giardino.
A little girl was playing in the garden.
Qualcuno mi disse che la bambina si chiamava Anna.
Someone told me that the little girl was called Anna.
In the first sentence, we use an indefinite article because we introduce an unknown element: a little girl. In the last sentence, we talk about something we have mentioned before, the little girl, so we use a definite article instead. This behavior is also reflected in English.
Italian indefinite articles and job positions
Unlike English, indefinite articles in Italian can be omitted before introducing a profession.
Sono avvocato.
I’m a lawyer.
Mio padre è contabile.
My father is an accountant.
Forms with an indefinite article are perfectly valid, too.
Sono un avvocato.
I’m a lawyer.
Mio padre è un contabile.
My father is an accountant.
Beware sentences with fare. You will have to use a definite article for these!
Faccio il pilota per una compagnia aerea.
I’m a pilot for an airline company.
Indefinite articles and quantifiers
You don’t have to use any articles to translate the quantifiers a few (alcuni/qualche) and a lot of (molti).
La polizia arrivò alcuni minuti più tardi.
The police arrived a few minutes later.
Abbiamo bevuto molta birra ieri sera.
We drank a lot of beer last night.
Indefinite articles with numbers
Unlike English, Italian doesn’t use any article with cento, a hundred, and mille, a thousand.
La tazza si sfracellò in mille pezzi.
The mug shattered into a thousand pieces.
Neanche cento persone sono andate al concerto.
Not even a hundred people went to the concert.
Indefinite articles and what a…!
You don’t need to use an article in Italian with what a…! exclamations.
Che giornata!
What a day!
Che bella vista!
What a beautiful view!
These differences aside, Italian indefinite articles behave much like the English indefinite articles a/an. If you feel like using a/an in English, you should do so in Italian too. Just make sure you pick the correct article in Italian.
And that’s it with the Italian indefinite articles! If you still have any doubts, feel free to leave a comment.
What next?
Now that you’ve seen how the Italian indefinite articles work, you might want to keep learning Italian online with these free Italian resources:
Or you might also want an excellent offline Italian grammar resource to take with you at all times (Amazon).
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