Masculine, feminine, neuter

All German nouns are classified grammatically as masculine, feminine, or neuter.

Knowing the gender of a noun will enable you to analyze

which have similar forms in different cases. These forms, in turn, will help you to determine the function of the noun in a sentence.

Do you now see the importance of learning a noun and its gender simultaneously?
The easiest way may be to memorize a noun and its corresponding definite article at the same time.

The ending of a noun gives you important grammatical information.
The first thing you should look for is if the noun is in the singular or plural form.
To decode the form correctly you have to know the gender of the noun.

Grammatical vs. biological gender

When referring to people, grammatical gender usually matches biological gender.

Objects or concepts, things that clearly have no biological gender, still possess a grammatical one based on the etymology, the linguistic history of the noun.

But don't be afraid. We won't make you learn the history of words!