MEPX
Chapter 4 of 10All chapters
  1. 1What punctuation is for
  2. 2Commas
  3. 3Colons and semicolons
  4. 4Apostrophes
  5. 5Dashes, hyphens and brackets
  6. 6Quotation marks
  7. 7Sentence endings
  8. 8Lists and bullets
  9. 9Numbers, dates and abbreviations
  10. 10Checking punctuation

Chapter 4 of 10

Apostrophes

Possession and contraction only.

The rules

Add apostrophe s for a singular owner, apostrophe alone after a plural ending in s. Contractions mark missing letters. Nothing else takes one.

  • Never for plurals: apples, not apple's.
  • Its and whose are possessive pronouns and take no apostrophe.

Awkward cases

Names ending in s usually take apostrophe s in modern style: James's. Joint ownership takes one apostrophe on the last name; separate ownership takes one each.