‘Hair is’ vs. ‘hair are’ vs. ‘hairs are’ in English

by Jakub Marian

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The soft matter covering your head is usually referred to using a plural noun in other languages, e.g. die Haare in German or les cheveux in French. In English, however, “hair” is a mass noun (just like “fur” or “grass”), and as such it is used with singular verbs:

correct My hair is long.
wrong My hair are long.
correct Her hair looks good.
wrong Her hair look good.

Since it is a mass noun, we don’t use the indefinite article before it:

correct She has beautiful hair.
wrong She has a beautiful hair.

It should be noted that “hair” in English does not refer only to the hair between one’s forehead and nape; it refers to any kind of “fur” covering some part of a person’s body. To avoid possible confusion, we often use adjectives when referring to “non-head” hair, e.g. facial hair (the beard and mustache in men), pubic hair (hair around the genital area), body hair, and so on.

“Hair” can also be used as a countable noun when referring to a single strand of hair. For example, you can say:

I found a hair in my soup.

You can also use “hair” in the plural when referring to several isolated hairs:

It is possible for two hairs to grow from a single follicle.

However, this is a relatively rare usage. When you speak about hair covering some part of the human body, you should never use “hairs”:

correct Which way would you like me to cut your hair?
wrong Which way would you like me to cut your hairs?

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