Apostrophe rules are shorter than the quarrels about them. The mark does two jobs: it shows missing letters (it's, can't) and possession (the student's essay, the students' essays). It never makes a plain plural; banana's and pea's are the grocer's apostrophe. Our view, marked as ours: the rules are worth keeping in a paper, but complaints about misuse are as old as the rules; Robert Baker was objecting in 1770, before the plural possessive had even settled.
EdCitation publishes this guide, built from a 2024 corpus study, four style guides, the Apostrophe Protection Society's site, official statements and named news reports, read on 2 October 2026; where a page refused us, we say so.
EdCitation never writes any part of anyone's work, and we hold that line gladly: every apostrophe you hand in is yours. It checks instead. Mechanics QA reads a finished file for formatting and the slips a spell-checker lets through, and Cite a source builds each reference from the publisher's record, apostrophes as the source printed them.
What are the apostrophe rules?
Every style guide we read agrees on the core: an apostrophe for missing letters and possession, never for a plain plural. They differ on names ending in s.
| Case | Write | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Contraction of it is or it has | it's raining | Merriam-Webster (n.d.) |
| Possessive of it | on its own, never on it's own | Merriam-Webster (n.d.) |
| A plain plural | cats, Tuesdays, never cat's, Tuesday's | APA (2023a) |
| A plural surname | the Joneses, the Chois | APA (2023a) |
| A plural surname, possessive | the Joneses' dog | APA (2023b); Rappaport (2017) |
| A singular name ending in s | James's, Descartes's, Dumas's, Harris's | APA (2023b); Rappaport (2017); University of Chicago Press (n.d.) |
| The same, in a British newspaper | Jones's, but Waters', Hedges' | The Guardian (n.d.) |
| Abbreviations and decades | HCPs, PhDs, 1900s | APA (2023a); Rappaport (2017) |
| A possessive citation | Graver et al.'s (2020) research | APA (2023b) |
| A title in your reference list | as the source printed it | Built by Cite a source, below |
Its or it's?
It's means it is or it has; its, the possessive, never takes an apostrophe. Merriam-Webster (n.d.) explains the muddle: a possessive it's appeared around 1600, and the form without the apostrophe took over only in the 18th century, probably because it's had begun to replace 'tis. The old form survives: a Marks & Spencer soda water label offered a drink "Perfect on it's own" (Low, 2023). A spell-checker passes both, since both are words, as our history of spell-checkers explains.
Apostrophes in plural names
A family name takes no apostrophe in the plural. APA (2023a) gives the Joneses, the Burches and the Chois, and says outright that an apostrophe never makes a plural. The possessive adds an apostrophe after the final s: the Joneses' dog (APA, 2023b; Rappaport, 2017).
Names ending in s: James's or James'?
APA, MLA and Chicago all add 's: James's, Descartes's, Dumas's, Harris's. Chicago did not always. Its first edition, in 1906, gave Moses' law for names of more than one syllable; the 12th edition of 1969 kept only Jesus, Moses and Greek names in -es as exceptions; and the 16th edition of 2010 dropped those too (University of Chicago Press, n.d.). British newspapers go by ear: the Guardian writes Jones's and James's but Waters' and Hedges' (The Guardian, n.d.). Your brief's style decides; Check your paper finds it, free.
Where did the apostrophe come from?
The apostrophe reached English print in the second half of the 16th century, most likely borrowed from French and Italian, first to mark letters left out, as in th'onely for "the only" (Calle-Martín & Pacheco-Franco, 2024). The Online Etymology Dictionary dates the word to the 1580s, from French, and notes that the mark often stood for the lost e of the old -es possessive (Harper, n.d.).
When did the possessive apostrophe arrive?
Earlier than many books say. Calle-Martín and Pacheco-Franco (2024) counted possessives in Early English Books Online: the -'s spelling was rare in the 1570s, ran level with plain -s between 1620 and 1640, and became the commoner form in the 1650s. That corrects older accounts dating it to the 18th century, and a 2013 blog post that put it in the 19th (Game, 2013). The plural possessive, students', settled in the late 18th century, and grammarians, the authors conclude, followed the printers.
Queens' College: a popular story, checked
Visitors hear that Queens' College, Cambridge, has its apostrophe after the s because two queens founded it, in 1448 and 1465. The college's history archive finds the story weak: the name had no apostrophe for two centuries, is first found as Queen's in 1660 and as Queens' in 1823, and changed in the University Calendar in 1831 (Queens' College History Archive, n.d.).
What is the grocer's apostrophe?
The grocer's apostrophe, or greengrocer's apostrophe, is an apostrophe put before the s of a plain plural: banana's, pea's, COFFEE'S. The Guardian's style guide names it, along with its twin, the apostrophe left out where one belongs (The Guardian, n.d.). John Richards found COFFEE'S in a café window near his home; the owner told him it looked better that way (CBC Radio, 2019).
The habit is old but was always rare in print. Calle-Martín and Pacheco-Franco (2024) trace it to the 17th century, yet only 40 of 84,025 plain plurals in their historical sample carried an apostrophe. Grammarians condemned it from the 18th century; Robert Baker asked in 1770 why an apostrophe should stand where no letter is missing. Beal (2010), read only in its abstract, sets the 21st-century return of public policing of punctuation against the little attention 18th-century grammarians gave it.
Who named it? Unconfirmed
Who coined the name is not settled. The Oxford English Dictionary has an entry for it, which Calle-Martín and Pacheco-Franco (2024) cite, but its page would not load for us, so we give no first date. Tréguer (2017) quotes the novelist Keith Waterhouse in English our English (1991) on greengrocers' generosity with apostrophes, but the passage does not use the name. Earlier dates repeated online are unconfirmed.
What was the Apostrophe Protection Society?
The Apostrophe Protection Society is a British campaign for correct apostrophes, founded by John Richards, a retired newspaper reporter and subeditor. Its pages give 2001 as the founding year, though its first webmaster recalls reading about the new society in the Daily Telegraph in 2000. Richards hoped for half a dozen supporters and, by his account, received more than 500 letters within a month (Apostrophe Protection Society, n.d.-c).
Why did it close in 2019?
In November 2019, aged 96, Richards closed the society, citing his age and fading public interest; his notice blamed "ignorance and laziness present in modern times" (Low, 2023). He told CBC Radio (2019) that he sent offenders a polite standard letter, and could not remember how Mid Devon's 2013 plan had ended; the interviewer told him he had won.
Who revived it?
Richards died in March 2021 (Apostrophe Protection Society, n.d.-c), and Bob McCalden revived the society with the blessing of Richards's son (Low, 2023). The dates differ: the home page says 2022, the About page late 2021, and The Times placed the relaunch at the start of 2023. The home page claims over 5,000 members, a figure we could not check (Apostrophe Protection Society, n.d.-a, n.d.-b). McCalden has forgiven Waterstones for dropping its apostrophe in 2012: a brand name, he says, is its owner's business (Low, 2023).
Why are councils removing apostrophes from street signs?
Councils that drop apostrophes cite databases and emergency services. The guidance is looser than that, and two of these three councils backed down.
- Birmingham, January 2009. The council made a habit of decades official. Councillor Martin Mullaney argued that the possessives described no one's property now, and that an ambulance should never miss a street over a forgotten apostrophe; Richards said the signs set schoolchildren a bad example (Haines, 2009). Birmingham did not reverse (Game, 2013).
- Mid Devon, March 2013. A draft policy proposed no apostrophes in new street names; the council said no national guidance forbade them, and only three official names had one. The Department for Communities and Local Government said ministers thought England's apostrophes "should be cherished" (HuffPost UK, 2013), and the council's leader, Peter Hare-Scott, said he would recommend allowing them (Game, 2013).
- North Yorkshire, May 2024. A new Harrogate sign read St Marys Walk. The council said addresses stored in databases must meet BS 7666 (Vigliarolo, 2024); McCalden called it cultural vandalism (Ames, 2024a). By 17 May the council's highways member, Keane Duncan, promised full punctuation on new signs and a corrected Harrogate sign (Ames, 2024b).
What the guidance actually says
GeoPlace, the Local Government Association and Ordnance Survey venture that builds the national address databases, says it does not advise councils whether to include or remove punctuation: that is each council's decision. It updated that statement on 10 May 2024, during the North Yorkshire row (GeoPlace, 2024). Its address manual, version 3.5 of May 2025, has councils record exactly the punctuation of the official name, and asks their naming policies to address names likely to be punctuated in different ways (GeoPlace, 2025). BS 7666 is a paid standard we could not read; The Register quotes guidance on it allowing punctuation that belongs to the designated name (Vigliarolo, 2024).
How do I check the apostrophes in my paper?
Check them in this order, from your brief's style to the finished file.
- Find your style. Check your paper, free, reads the citation style from your brief into a checklist, and the style decides James's or James'.
- Search for it's. Read each as it is or it has; where that fails, write its.
- Search for 's on plain plurals. Decades, abbreviations and surnames take none.
- Check possessive plurals. students', the Joneses', children's.
- Check possessive citations. APA puts the 's after the second author or after et al.: Petrovich and Keefer's (2023) research (APA, 2023b).
- Leave titles alone. A reference copies the source's title, apostrophes and all; Cite a source builds it from the record.
- Verify the list. Verify references, free, marks each reference verified, "check this" or not found, and flags retracted papers.
- Run the file last. Mechanics QA for formatting and the language slips a spell-checker misses.
For contractions in your own sentences, see our guide to academic tone.
What Cite a source did with two sources
On 2 October 2026 we gave Cite a source two sources. From the DOI of the corpus study, whose title quotes a 17th-century line, it built this APA 7 entry, keeping every old apostrophe and dating it by the 2024 printed issue, not the 2023 online date:
Calle-Martín, J., & Pacheco-Franco, M. (2024). ‘The night before beg’d ye queens’s pardon and his brother’s’: The apostrophe in the history of English. English Language and Linguistics, 28(2), 227–246. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1360674323000552
From the address of GeoPlace's statement, it read a short title, no author and 11 June 2020, so the entry began "Apostrophes. (2020, June 11). GeoPlace LLP." A web page's details can be corrected before the entry is built: we made GeoPlace the author, used the page's heading as the title and gave 10 May 2024, the update the page records.
How does EdCitation help with apostrophes?
For the last mechanical read of a paper, Mechanics QA is the best tool EdCitation has, and this guide shows why: its and it's are both real words to a spell-checker, and Mechanics QA is built for the slips a spell-checker lets through, by rule, with no model reading the paper. Mechanics QA checks formatting against the APA 7 student paper, finds comments, tracked changes and placeholders left in the file, matches each citation to the reference list, looks each reference up in the publisher's record, and flags figures that disagree between sections. Every finding names the rule it broke and the fix. We do not claim it finds every stray apostrophe; the last read of its and it's is yours. It is part of Pro at $8 a month, and a free account can run it three times a month (pricing).
The research half is free: Find sources searched "greengrocer's apostrophe" on 2 October 2026 and returned 21 works, led by Beal's "The grocer's apostrophe: popular prescriptivism in the 21st century", then the corpus study. Other marks have guides of their own: the Oxford comma debate, full stops and quotation marks, and, for the spellings the apostrophe sits in, why English spelling is so strange.
Quick questions
Is it its or it's?
It's means it is or it has; its, the possessive, never takes an apostrophe: the council changed its policy, and it's back on the sign.
What is the grocer's apostrophe?
An apostrophe wrongly placed in a plain plural, as in banana's or pea's for bananas and peas. Also called the greengrocer's apostrophe, it goes back to the 17th century.
Does the Apostrophe Protection Society still exist?
Yes. John Richards closed it in 2019, and Bob McCalden revived it after Richards died in 2021; sources date the relaunch 2022 or 2023.
Why do councils remove apostrophes from street signs?
They cite databases and emergency services. GeoPlace, which compiles the address data for England and Wales, says punctuation is each council's decision, and North Yorkshire reversed its plan in May 2024.
Can EdCitation check the apostrophes in my essay?
Mechanics QA, in Pro, checks a finished paper's formatting and the slips a spell-checker lets through, each with its rule and fix. Cite a source, free, keeps a title's apostrophes as published. EdCitation never rewrites your sentences.
References
- American Psychological Association. (2023a). Plural nouns [Archived copy]. APA Style. https://web.archive.org/web/20260930140035/https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/grammar/plural-nouns
- American Psychological Association. (2023b). Possessive nouns [Archived copy]. APA Style. https://web.archive.org/web/20260711170659/https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/grammar/possessive-nouns
- Ames, E. (2024a, May 7). North Yorkshire to drop apostrophes from street signs. LocalGov. https://www.localgov.co.uk/North-Yorkshire-to-drop-apostrophes-from-street-signs/60329
- Ames, E. (2024b, May 17). Apostrophe 'lives on' in North Yorkshire. LocalGov. https://www.localgov.co.uk/Apostrophe-lives-on-in-North-Yorkshire/60420
- Apostrophe Protection Society. (n.d.-a). About us. https://www.apostrophe.org.uk/about
- Apostrophe Protection Society. (n.d.-b). Apostrophe Protection Society: Defending the apostrophe. https://www.apostrophe.org.uk/
- Apostrophe Protection Society. (n.d.-c). Our history. https://www.apostrophe.org.uk/history
- Beal, J. C. (2010). The grocer's apostrophe: Popular prescriptivism in the 21st century. English Today, 26(2), 57–64. https://doi.org/10.1017/S026607841000009X
- Calle-Martín, J., & Pacheco-Franco, M. (2024). 'The night before beg'd ye queens's pardon and his brother's': The apostrophe in the history of English. English Language and Linguistics, 28(2), 227–246. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1360674323000552
- CBC Radio. (2019, December 2). Apostrophe Protection Society shuts down after 18 years, blaming 'ignorance and laziness'. As It Happens. https://www.cbc.ca/radio/asithappens/as-it-happens-monday-edition-1.5380932/apostrophe-protection-society-shuts-down-after-18-years-blaming-ignorance-and-laziness-1.5380935
- Game, C. (2013, March 29). Street names – Mid Devon fails Birmingham's comma sense test. INLOGOV Blog. https://inlogov.com/2013/03/29/streetnames/
- GeoPlace. (2024, May 10). GeoPlace statement on use of apostrophes in street naming and numbering. https://www.geoplace.co.uk/street-naming-and-numbering/guidance-for-officers/street-naming-numbering-best-practice/apostrophes
- GeoPlace. (2025). GeoPlace data entry conventions and best practice for addresses (DEC-Addresses Version 3.5). https://static.geoplace.co.uk/downloads/GeoPlace-Data-Entry-Conventions-Best-Practice-for-Addresses.pdf
- The Guardian. (n.d.). Guardian and Observer style guide: A. https://www.theguardian.com/guardian-observer-style-guide-a
- Haines, L. (2009, January 30). Birmingham drops the possessive apostrophe. The Register. https://www.theregister.com/2009/01/30/brum_apostrophe_shocker/
- Harper, D. (n.d.). Apostrophe. In Online Etymology Dictionary. https://www.etymonline.com/word/apostrophe
- HuffPost UK. (2013, March 15). Mid Devon Council to ban apostrophes from street signs. https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2013/03/15/mid-devon-council-to-ban-apostrophes-street-signs_n_2885308.html
- Low, V. (2023, September 4). All's forgiven, apostrophe guardian tells Waterstones. The Times. https://www.thetimes.com/uk/article/alls-forgiven-apostrophe-guardian-tells-waterstones-7t0csh2jm
- Merriam-Webster. (n.d.). The tangled history of 'it's' and 'its' [Archived copy]. https://web.archive.org/web/20260515235350/https://www.merriam-webster.com/grammar/the-tangled-history-of-its-and-its
- Queens' College History Archive. (n.d.). That apostrophe. Queens' College, Cambridge. https://history.queens.cam.ac.uk/college/apostrophe
- Rappaport, J. (2017, September 20). Apostrophes: One mark, three ways. MLA Style Center. https://style.mla.org/apostrophes-three-ways/
- Tréguer, P. (2017, December 19). The story of 'greengrocer's apostrophe', a.k.a. 'apostrofly'. Word Histories. https://wordhistories.net/2017/12/19/greengrocers-apostrophe-apostrofly/
- University of Chicago Press. (n.d.). Possessives and attributives [Q&A]. The Chicago Manual of Style Online. https://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/qanda/data/faq/topics/PossessivesandAttributives/faq0066.html
- Vigliarolo, B. (2024, May 7). Council drops apostrophe from street names, blames databases. The Register. https://www.theregister.com/2024/05/07/north_yorkshire_council_blames_databases/