Native and assimilated nouns in Slovenian obligatorily have a root and an ending (marking number, gender, case); they may also have a one or more prefixes or suffixes, which occur always in the following order: PREFIX + ROOT + SUFFIX + ENDING. Examples are given in the table below. More than one root is also possible, as in the following examples of compounds: ȃvtoindustrîja ‘auto industry’; delodajȃlec ‘employer’ ← delo ‘work’ + dajalec ‘giver’.

Nouns distinguish three genders (Masculine, Feminine and Neuter), six cases (Nominative, Accusative, Genitive, Dative, Locative, Instrumental), and three numbers (Singular, Plural, Dual). With respect to inanimate referents, gender is determined by form class, a property of whole paradigms (prédnost ‘advantage’ = F, ríba ‘fish’ = F, cérkev ‘church’ = F, kozȏlec ‘hayrick’ = M, pojmovȃnje ‘conceptualization’ = N). In terms of grammatical agreement the actual sex of human and animal referents are usually assigned to their respective gender class (e.g., Milȇna Mȏ̡horič = F, Joȃn d’Ȃrc [ˈʒɑ̀ːn ˈdɑ̀ːɾk]= F, gospá ‘Mrs.’ = F, Jánez ‘John’ = M, Žîga ‘Ziggy’ = M, gospȏd ‘Mr.’ = M; kráva ‘cow’ = F, bìk ‘bull’ = M), though there are some rare exceptions, e.g., mlȃdo dekle ‘young girl’ = N.

With only the Nominative-SG form, which is the dictionary entry from (except in the case of nouns that occur only in the plural), the gender cannot always be readily determined without further information. For example, nouns ending in -a are usually feminine (míza ‘table’, vó̡da ‘water’, žé̡na ‘wife’, zémlja ‘earth’, amnestîja ‘amnesty’), but some are masculine (kolȇga ‘colleague’, vȏjvoda ‘duke’, apartmȃ ‘rental apartment’). Words ending in –Ø are usually masculine (kmèt ‘farmer’, mȏž ‘man, husband’, dežník ‘umbrella’, gȏst ‘guest’), though some are feminine (nìt ‘thread’, cérkev ‘church’, kȏst ‘bone’, po̡dlost ‘vileness’). Nouns ending in –o are usually neuter (mesȏ ‘meat’, testȏ ‘dough’, darílo ‘gift’), but some are masculine (Mȃrko ‘Mark’, pîkolo ‘piccolo’, kȏnto ‘account’). Though these statements imply that there is a low degree of grammatical gender predictability, in fact many of the “exceptional” types can be determined by virtue of somewhat heterogeneous rules regarding the properties of stem shapes or suffixes, e.g., nouns with stems ending in –kev are always feminine (cérkev ‘church’, re̡dkev ‘radish’, bȗkev ‘beech’); abstract nouns in –ost are always feminine; most borrowed words in –o are masculine (ȃvto ‘car’, lȏto ‘lottery’, renȃult [rɛˈnòː]).

Feminine paradigms

Masculine paradigms

Neuter paradigms

As is clear from the above, Slovenian grammar distinguishes three numbers, SG-PL-DU. Logically, then, PL denotes quantities larger than two. However, it should be noted that items that are normally paired (eyes, hands, legs, etc.) are expressed in the PL and take PL agreement, Imaš lepe oči ‘You have beautiful eyes’, Roke gor! ‘Hands up! However, in marked circumstances, when the pairedness of the items is in focus, the DU can be used: Drži z obema rokama! ‘Hold on with both hands (i.e. not just one)!’