It's/its

Apostrophe or no apostrophe?

For some, it’s punctuation at its trickiest! I’ve become so used to seeing these two little words used wrongly that I sometimes do a double-take when they are correct.  

Wrong: Its all about you.
Right: It’s all about you.

Wrong: Enjoy seaside living at it’s best.  
Right: Enjoy seaside living at its best.

At some point, the way we use the two versions may simply swap over. But in the meantime, here are the two rules for the apostrophes. All you need to do is check which meaning you intend.

Rule 1: It’s = it is. Use an apostrophe.

Here, the apostrophe shows there is a missing letter: it's instead of it is. This is known as a contraction – a shortened form of two words. Here are some other examples:

Winter’s coming (winter is coming)
Let's (let us)
That’s (that is)
Don’t (do not)
He’ll (he will)

Rule 2: Its = belonging to it. No apostrophe.

Its is known as a possessive pronoun, showing that something belongs to ‘it’. There is no apostrophe:

Summer is at its peak.
The bird feeds its young.
The arrow missed its mark.

This also applies to the other possessive pronouns: his, her/hers, our/ours, your/yours, their/theirs. None has an apostrophe.

So why the confusion?

There is a valid reason why some people have trouble sorting out it’s and its. The problem is when we indicate possession. As we’ve seen, possessive pronouns never have an apostrophe.

But, just to make things more confusing, we do add an apostrophe to show possession when we use a noun or a name:

         The cat’s pyjamas
         Rosemary’s baby
         Yesterday’s news
         Children’s health
         The sun’s rays

If you have always been unsure about apostrophes for its/it’s, this could be why. When you’re indicating possession, the apostrophe rule depends whether you are using a pronoun or a noun:

• pronouns: no apostrophe (its, his, theirs etc)
• nouns or names: apostrophe (the dog’s).