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Articles with Countable and Uncountable Nouns

Notice that we use the indefinite article a/an ONLY with singular countable nouns: a dog, an egg, a very big man, an extremely delicious meal
By contrast, we can use the definite article the with ALL nouns: the dog, the eggs, the big men, the music, the food, the red wine
It is sometimes also possible to have no article at all—the so-called ZERO article. This can happen with all nouns (but normally not singular countable nouns): dogs, eggs, hot meals, music, red wine
T he following table shows how we usually use articles with countable and uncountable nouns, but see EnglishClub Tip below for more about this.
In English, a singular countable noun usually needs an article (or other determiner) in front of it. We cannot say:

• 
  I saw elephant yesterday.
  

We need to say something like:

• 
  I saw an elephant.
  
• 
  I saw a pink elephant.
  
• 
  I saw the elephant.
  
• 
  I saw your elephant.
  

But see ZERO Article for cases when no article or other determiner is needed.

Some

W e use ‘some’ for the plural form of all nouns and for uncountables. (An uncountable noun is a word that only has the singular form, e.g. ‘sugar’.) For example:
Here are some examples:
Would you like some wine?
Here are some photos of our last holiday.
We need some milk. Can you get a carton when you go out?
Some people are sunbathing in the park.
There are some fun places to go in my town.
I eat some biscuits and drink some coffee for breakfast every day.
No article
It can be difficult to know when not to use an article in English, especially when you translate from your native language which has different rules for articles. Here are the main cases when we don’t use an article:

• 
  Don’t use an article with possessive adjectives. For example, “She’s my friend” and not “She’s a my friend.”
  
• 
  Don’t use an article with a general topic. For example, compare the following sentences
  

– I love music. (meaning music in general)
– I love the music you’re playing. (meaning this specific music)

• 
  Don’t put an article in front of country names except when they include ‘kingdom’, ‘states’ and ‘lands’. For example:
  

– France (without ‘the’)
– The Netherlands (with ‘the’)