its
its - English
Alternative forms
- it's (possessive form, now nonstandard)
Pronunciation
- IPA: /ɪts/
- Homophone: it's
Determiner
its
- Belonging to it.
Derived terms
Translations
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Contraction
its
- Misspelling of it's.
Pronoun
its
- The one (or ones) belonging to it.
Usage notes
- In practice, its is commonly used as a determiner before a noun, but its use as a solo pronoun is generally avoided.
- Its is now distinguished from it's (a contraction of "it is" or "it has"). For example, It's going to rain is equivalent to It is going to rain, and It's been raining for hours is equivalent to It has been raining for hours. However, the two are commonly confused, and using its where there should be it's (or vice versa) is a common mistake in written English.
- Like it, its is usually avoided when referring to humans. Its is commonly used with animals when the gender is unknown or unimportant. With humans, person is used for a person whose gender is unknown or to refer to something that could be possessed by either gender, body or corpse is often used to refer to a dead person, and figure, shape, and silhouette are often used to refer to what someone sees as a person but can't see clearly enough to determine an identity or gender, e.g. The figure moved behind a bush, but Josh could see its shadow from the moonlight.
Quotations
- For quotations using this term, see its.
Translations
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Noun
its
- plural of it
Anagrams
its - Kalasha
Noun
its
- Alternative spelling of ič̣