This article deals with the partitive case, which answers the questions “mitä?” and “ketä?”. It’s a topic that will continue to be challenging for a very long time while you’re learning Finnish. My advice is to take it little by little and not try to learn it all at once.

1. Use of the Partitive Case (mitä, ketä)

The partitive has no equivalent in English and many other languages. That makes it hard to understand what its function is. In some cases, the use of the partitive coincides with the plural form in other languages, but it’s not the same as the plural.

When a group of words all belong together (say: a pronoun, an adjective and a noun), all three of them will be put in the partitive.

• “There are three [beautiful young women] in the room.” becomes “Huoneessa on kolme [kaunista nuorta naista].“
• “I buy ten [playful cats].” becomes “Ostan kymmenen [leikkisää kissaa].“
• “I have two [crying unhappy children].” becomes “Minulla on kaksi [itkevää surullista lasta].“

1.1. After numbers

The partitive is used in connection with the numbers. Because of that, many new language learners assume the partitive is the plural form. This is not the case. There is a separate plural (the plural nominative) and in addition there is also a partitive plural.

You don’t use the partitive after the number “yksi”, but you do use it after the number “nolla”. Adjectives will be inflected in the same case as the noun they’re connected to.

1.2. After words that express a quantity

We use the partitive case with words that express a quantity, an amount. For example, the words kuppi, kulho and lasi are things which contain an amount of something. Units of measurement (litra, kilo, metri, gramma) also express an amount. These words are very much like numbers in that sense.

You can find more words that express quantity here.

1.3. With mass nouns

When you’re dealing with an indefinite amount of something, you will use the partitive case. This is especially common with mass nouns (ainesana). For example, the word maito (milk) is a mass noun because we can’t count it in units. We can’t say “one milk, two milks”. Instead, you say yksi litra maitoa (one liter of milk) or yksi kulho maitoa (a bowl of milk).

You will use the partitive case with mass nouns in “minulla on” -sentences (#1), object sentences (#2). By using the partitive case, you express that you’re dealing with an indefinite, unspecified amount of the mass noun. You don’t know how much it is exactly; just some amount.

You can often recognise mass nouns when translating them to English. First, these nouns generally don’t get an article (“I buy milk” rather than “I buy a milk”). In addition, most of the time, the English translation could include the word “some”.

In complement sentences (#3) you will have an article (e.g. “Maito on kylmää” means “The milk is cold”). You can read more about complement sentences in this article. In addition, you can also take a look at how Duolingo introduces this type of sentences in this article.

1.4. With negative sentences

In almost all sentence types, you will have the partitive in a negative sentence. Exception: complement sentences (predikatiivilause).

1.5. With irresultative phrases

Irresultative means the action is incomplete (versus resultative, which is complete). When an activity is currently taking place, you will put the object in the partitive. The result of the action hasn’t been achieved yet. The partitive might also be meant like in part 1.3., where you plan to read some of the book, but not all of it. You can find similar examples here.

1.6. With partitive verbs

Some verbs always require the object to appear in the partitive case. These are called “partitive verbs“. You will need to learn these by heart, because English doesn’t have anything comparable.

1.7. With prepositions

Prepositions are fairly uncommon in Finnish, but they do exist. Read more about them on my Finnish prepositions page.

2. The Formation of the Partitive Case

The ending of the partitive can be -a, -ta or -tta, depending on what kind of word they are attached to. In order to correctly choose between -a and -ä, you will need to first learn about vowel harmony.

2.1. The partitive of the personal pronouns

The partitive of personal pronouns goes as follows:

2.2. Words ending in a single vowel (-a/-ä, -u/-y, -o/-ö): add -a/-ä

2.3. Words ending in 2 vowels

2.3.1. Words ending in two of the same vowel: add -ta/-tä

2.3.2. Words of one syllable ending in two vowels: add -ta/-tä

This rule covers words with both two of the same vowel and two different vowels, as long as the word is one syllable.

2.3.3. Adjectives ending in two different vowels

Adjectives fairly regularly end in -ea/eä. In these cases, we can use both the ending -a/-ä and -ta/-tä. The single -a is much more common in current Finnish, so I would suggest using that form. In spoken language, you will hear vaikeeta, tärkeetä and nopeeta, with a long vowel sound.

2.3.4. Nouns ending in two different vowels

Nouns ending in -ia will get one -a/-ä added to their end in the partitive case. Nouns with other vowel combinations will get -ta/-tä

2.4. Words ending in –i

Find out more about the inflection of different types of words ending in -i!

2.4.1. New words ending in -i: add -a/-ä

New words are often loanwords. Usually they’re recognisable because they resemble words in other languages, like pankki for “bank”, or paperi for “paper”. Loanwords are easier than Finnish words because they don’t undergo as many changes when you add endings.

2.4.2. Old words ending in -i: replace -i with -ea/-eä

Old words are very often nature words. After all, nature has been around for so long that Finns have had names for them since the very beginning. Some words’ age can be confusing, for example äiti “mother” is actually a new Finnish word, even though mothers have been around since the beginning of time!

I have a more extensive list of words that belong to this type here.

2.4.3. Old words ending in -si: replace -si with -tta/-ttä

More old words, but this time with -si at their end. It’s also important that this rule is only for old words, which means new words like kurssi (kurssia) and marssi (marssia) are excluded from this rule.

I have a more extensive list of words that belong to this type here.

2.4.4. Old words ending in -li, -ni or -ri: replace -i with -ta/-tä

This rule is not 100 % foolproof. There are words that end in -hi, like lohi for example, that become lohta in the partitive. It’s also important that this rule is only for old words, which means words like lääkäri (lääkäriä), jonglööri (jonglööria) and konduktööri (konduktööria) are excluded from this rule. Exceptional: lapsi > lasta; lumi > lunta.

I have a more extensive list of words that belong to this type here.

2.5. Words ending in -e: add -tta/-ttä

There are some words that end in -e that are exempt to this rule. These include names (Ville → Villeä), and some other words (kolme → kolmea, itse → itseä, nukke → nukkea).

2.6. Words ending in a consonant

2.6.1. Words ending in -nen: replace the -nen with -sta/-stä

Words ending in -nen are a very common wordtype in Finnish. For the partitive case, you will remove the –nen from the basic form and replace it with -sta/stä.

2.6.2. General rule for other words ending in a consonant

Most words ending in a consonant will get -ta/tä in the partitive case. This is true for most word types ending in a consonant. If you’re a beginner, you don’t need to look any further into these word types for now, it’s best to learn their inflection in more detail once you master the easier word types.

The general rule applies to words of the following wordtypes:

• Words ending in -as: rikas, pesuallas, hammas
• Words ending in -os: ostos, luonnos, kosmos
• Words ending in -ton: työtön, rasvaton, hyödytön
• Words ending in -in: puhelin, avain, leivänpaahdin
• Words ending in -ut/nut: lyhyt, kevyt, väsynyt
• Words ending in -tar: tytär, kuningatar, näyttelijätär
• Words ending in -l, -n, -r: kyynel, ien, manner

2.6.3. Words ending in -us/ys

Normally, words ending in -Us just fall under rule 2.6.2 and get -tA added to their basic form. However, there are some words ending in -Us that will behave differently. You can read more about the difference here.

Some guidelines for finding the right conjugation:

2.6.4. Non-Finnish words ending in a consonant

Loanwords and foreign names (e.g. Jonathan, Facebook) which end in a consonant will have an extra -i- added before the partitive’s -a/ä.

You might also want to check out these two articles:

3. Consonant Gradation in the Partitive Case

The partitive is complicated in many ways, but when it comes to consonant gradation it’s simple: the partitive form of each word will have the same consonants as the basic form. For wordtype A that means always strong, and for wordtype B always weak!

I have a separate article on wordtype A.

I have a separate article on wordtype B.

4. The Partitive Case in Spoken Finnish

In spoken Finnish, the partitive ending –a can assimilate. This is only the case for certain vowel combinations: -oa, -öä, -ua, -yä, -ia, -iä, -ea, -eä. The partitive’s -a will be replaced by another of the word’s final vowel.

Adjectives such as vaikea end in a diphthong (see section 2.3.3). There words’ partitive is also special in spoken Finnish. That’s because the basic form will already be different in spoken language: vaikea will be vaikee in spoken language. This is only the case for adjectives ending in -ea/eä.

When we want to make vaikee partitive, we are dealing with a word that ends in a long vowel (see section 2.3.1). Thus, we use the –ta ending for these words. In fact, even if written Finnish, we can say vaikeata, but it’s much less common than vaikeaa.

That concludes the article on the partitive case!

Related posts:

Finnish Prepositions – Finnish Grammar The Verb Harrastaa – Talking about Your Hobbies So-Called Partitive Verbs – Not Always Partitive? Inflection of words like UUSI – Käsi vuosi kuukausi