hair (singular and plural usage) (2025)

We should always use singular "hair" and singular verb for head hair:
Tom is my friend. His hair is brown. (I am talking about the hair on his head)

......

We should use plural "hairs" and plural verb for detached hair.

(Situations when hair get detached)
When we talk about detached hair, like when girls comb their hair, some of the hair become detached from the skull and fall on the dress, or .. when a pet (like a dog or a cat) is sitting in our lap...and we pat on their back, some of the hair get detached and fall in our hands and clothes...

For example,
Today morning, while preparing to go to the office, I noticed that I had some cat hairs on my shirt.
Last night when I went to my bedroom for sleep, I saw some hairs on my bed. They were my wife's hairs. She was combing on my bed in the day.

Is the rule correct, please?

If you use some, you can use singular or plural.

When I went downstairs this morning, I found some hair/hairs on the sofa, where my cat had been sleeping.

Here some hairs refers to a small number of hairs, which can also be expressed by some hair.

It depends on whether you regard the hairs individually or as a group.

entangledbank said:

Plural hairs are for a small number of them. If you cut your hair, that leaves loose hair on the floor or on a towel. These are in large numbers, even in a small clump - we don't talk about them as individual hairs. You might take four or five cat hairs off your shirt, or pull a few hairs out of the comb.

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Is the first part of the rule correct? i.e always use singular "hair" and singular verb for head hair,
"His hair is brown."

Roymalika said:

Is the first part of the rule correct? i.e always use singular "hair" and singular verb for head hair,
"His hair is brown."

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Yes that bit's correct.

Edinburgher said:

Once it falls out, it can be singular or plural: He has a few hairs on his jacket.

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Can you explain when it can be singular and when it can be plural, please?

Roymalika said:

Can you explain when it can be singular and when it can be plural, please?

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This depends on the intention of the speaker. Use the singular if you are treating it as "a quantity" of hair. Then it's a mass noun.
Use the plural if you are treating it as a number of hairs. Then it's a count noun.
Of course as a count noun, when there is only one hair, you would also use the singular.

Wife to husband (who has short black hair): "What's that long blonde hair doing on your shoulder? Your secretary has hair like that, doesn't she?"
Reply: "I don't know, darling. It must have blown there in the breeze from the air conditioning."
Wife: "A likely story. Why don't you admit it? You've been canoodling, haven't you?"
Husband: "No, of course not, dear. I was just hugging her to comfort her. She was very upset because her cat had died."

If someone is nearly bald, i.e. has very small number of hairs on their skull (like the child in the below photo), should I use "hair" or "hairs"?

The child (in the photo) has brown hair/hairs.
His hair/hairs are brown.

(Suppose the colour of the hair is brown.)

No.

Besides, it looks like the child does not have a very small number of hairs on his head, it's just that his hair (singular) has been cut or shaved very short.

Edinburgher said:

No

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What do you mean?

Sorry, I meant no, we would not use the plural here. The basic "rule" for head hair still applies: use the singular.

(I had mis-read the question as "Should I use the plural hairs for this?")

Edinburgher said:

Sorry, I meant no, we would not use the plural here. The basic "rule" for head hair still applies: use the singular.

(I had mis-read the question as "Should I use the plural hairs for this?")

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Thank you for clarifying.
I couldn't find the exact photo for my situation. I wanted to ask, if someone's almost bald and has very small number of hair

, ( not shaved or cut as in the above child photo) then would the plural "hairs" be correct, as Entangledbank advised to use plural hairs for small number of hairs?

If you are primarily talking about what their hair colour is, then always use the singular.
If all his hair has fallen out except for a very small number of hairs, you could say he has only half a dozen hairs left. But as I implied in #9, there is no rule for this. It depends on whether you

treat it as a mass noun or a count noun.

I am almost bald, so I ha

Roymalika said:

If someone is nearly bald, i.e. has very small number of hairs on their skull (like the child in the below photo), should I use "hair" or "hairs"?...

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I am nearly bald, so I have some experience with this situation. We use "hair," just as if the person had a full head of hair. It is very rare for a person with normal male pattern baldness to have so few hairs that we would think of them as "hairs." There may be some medical conditions like this, but I don't know about them.

There is an old pun, which must be spoken aloud:

A: I just got a haircut.
B: Oh? Which one?