Today we’ll be talking about possessive pronouns in Spanish. Unlike possessive adjectives, which are followed by nouns, possessive pronouns stand on their own. They are used in a bit different way than in English, though. Sometimes they are accompanied by an article, sometimes not. In this article we’ll discuss it in detail.
The Forms of Possessive Pronouns in Spanish
There are separate forms of possessive pronouns for each gender and number. Below is the full list of all possible forms.
| Singular | Plural | |||
| masculine | feminine | masculine | feminine | |
| mío | mía | míos | mías | mine |
| tuyo | tuya | tuyos | tuyas | yours |
| suyo | suya | suyos | suyas | his/hers |
| nuestro | nuestra | nuestros | nuestras | ours |
| vuestro | vuestra | vuestros | vuestras | yours |
| suyo | suya | suyos | suyas | theirs |
Possessive Pronouns after the Verb ser
If the possessive pronoun is used after the verb ser, we don’t use articles. In the following examples we have possessive adjectives in the first sentence of each pair and their corresponding possessive pronouns in the second sentence.
| Esto es mi libro. | This is my book. |
| El libro es mío. | The book is mine. |
| Esto es tu mesa. | This is your table. |
| La mesa es tuya. | The table is yours. |
| Esto son sus coches. | These are his/her/their cars. |
| Los coches son suyos. | The cars are his/hers/theirs. |
Possessive Pronouns with Articles
Otherwise, if the possessive pronoun stands on its own, for example as the subject of a sentence, we use definite articles:
| Mi escuela es grande. | My school is big. |
| La mía es grande. | Mine is big. |
| Nuestra ciudad es rica. | Our city is rich. |
| La nuestra es rica. | Ours is rich. |
| Sus libros son viejos. | His/her/their books are old. |
| Los suyos son viejos. | His/hers/theirs are old. |
Other Examples
Possessive pronouns can be used in a couple other ways, which is illustrated below.
If they are accompanied by an indefinite article, then the meaning is one of (e.g. un amigo tuyo – a friend of yours or one of your friends).
Possessive pronouns may accompany nouns as well. Then they follow the nouns and act as possessive adjectives. You can see it in examples like ¡Dios mío! below. This is often the case in exclamations like here. In non-exclamatory sentences we use an article before the noun (for example el libro suyo). They may also be used in constructions like none of… like in the last example.
| un amigo tuyo | a friend of yours |
| ¡Dios mío! | My God! |
| ¡Hijo mío! | My son! |
| el libro suyo | his/her/its/their/your (formal) book |
| nuestro hijo | our son |
| el hijo nuestro | our son |
| No es asunto mío. | It´s none of my business. |