Genitive case. Plural nouns

1. To form the genitive plural you need to look at the nominative singular form of the noun.
2. Masculine and feminine nouns that end in a soft sign (-ь) will have the ending -eй in the genitive plural:

   gender	singular	plural
   masc	учитель	учителей
   	портфель	портфелей
   fem	площадь	площадей
   	кровать	кроватей

3. The ending -eй is also taken by nouns that end in the consonants ж, ш, ч, щ:

   singular	plural
   карандаш	карандашей
   врач	врачей
   этаж	этажей
   товарищ	товарищей

4. The ending -eй is also taken by soft stem neuter nouns (nouns that end in a consonant and -e):

   singular	plural
   море	морей
   поле	полей

5. Masculine and feminine nouns that end in a vowel (-a, -я), neuter nouns that end in -o, and nouns with the suffix -ин, form the genitive plural by dropping the last vowel or suffix. Sometime this is called zero ending:

   gender	singular	plural
   masculine	коллега	коллег
   	мужчина	мужчин
   feminine	книга	книг
   	газета	газет
   neuter	яблоко	яблок
   	письмо	писем
   -ин	англичанин	англичан

6. Nouns that end in -я preserve the softness of the last consonant in the genitive plural by adding the soft sign (-ь):

   singular	plural
   неделя	недель
   героиня	героинь

7. Nouns that end in -ия, -ие and -eя will add the consonant -й after dropping the last vowel:

   singular	plural
   фамилия	фамилий
   лаборатория	лабораторий
   идея	идей
   общежитие	общежитий

8. Masculine nouns that end in a hard consonant will have the ending -ов in the genitive plural:

   singular	plural
   журнал	журналов
   город	городов

9. Masculine nouns that end in the consonant -й will have the ending -ев in the genitive plural:

   singular	plural
   музей	музеев
   трамвай	трамваев

10. Remember to follow Spelling rule 3 when working with nouns that end in the consonant -ц:

    	singular	plural
    unaccented	месяц	месяцев
    accented	отец	отцов

11. Nouns that have an extended stem in the plural form the genitive plural from the extended stem:

    nom. sg.	nom. pl.	gen. pl.
    брат	братья	братьев

12. The plural of человек (person) is люди. Russian also uses the word человек in the genitive plural with numerals and with the indefinite expression несколько.
13. In all other instances the genitive plural of люди (людей) is used.