Explanation

Quick Answer

All Spanish nouns (sustantivos), including people, places, animals, things, ideas, and feelings, have a gender (male or female).

The fact that inanimate objects have a gender in Spanish does not mean that things like tables and books are physically feminine or masculine. They have genders in a grammatical sense and must be used with articles and adjectives that match their gender.

There are a few general rules you can follow to determine if a noun is feminine or masculine.

Masculine Nouns

Most masculine nouns end in o. An o ending can indicate that a person or animal is male or that an object, idea, etc. is grammatically masculine.

Masculine Nouns that End in O

examples
el cartero the mailman/postman
el niño the child/son
el tío the uncle
el teatro the theater
el dormitorio the bedroom

Masculine Nouns that Don't End in O

Words that end in the following letters or letter combinations are often masculine:

an accented vowel (á, é, í, ó, ú)
-ma
a consonant other than d, z
e

Not all words ending in -ma are masculine. Some, like forma(form), are feminine.

There are also many common words ending in e that are feminine, so this rule must be taken with a grain of salt.

The table below shows examples of masculine words with the endings listed above.

Ending	Examples
e	el perfume(perfume), el estante(shelf), el maquillaje(makeup)
accented vowel	el colibrí(hummingbird), el ají(chili pepper) , el ñandú(rhea)
consonant other than d, z	el árbol(tree), el rumor(rumor), el cojín(cushion)
-ma	el programa(program), el drama(drama), el idioma(language)

Borrowing From Greek!

A lot of nouns that end in -ma, -pa, and -ta are masculine because they are Greek in origin.

Exceptions

The following nouns are exceptions to the above rules and are feminine, not masculine.

Words Ending in o	Words Ending in e	Words Ending in Consonants Besides d or z
la