The Indefinte Article

“a& an”

Usage

We use the indefinite article “a/an” with singular countable nouns:

a boy, a girl, a cat

The indefinite article has no plural form.

a boy — boys

We use an if the following word starts with a vowel sound.

a unit

This u sounds like a consonant, it starts with “j”, so we use a.

an uncle

This u sounds like a vowel, so we use an.

Pronunciation

Mind the pronunciation of the following word.

Use of the Indefinite Article “a/an”

Before phrases of time and measurements

We have English 4 times a week.

I go on holiday twice a year.

Our car can do 220 kilometres an hour.

Tomatoes are $2 a kilo.

Before jobs

My father is a car mechanic.

With a noun complement

He is a good boy.

Before nationalities

Bruce Springsteen is an American.

“half” / “quite” / “such” + noun

We need half a pound of sugar.

This is quite a good story.

He's such a good developer!