Its vs It's: The One-Second Test
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Short answer
It's always means *it is* or *it has*: "It's raining." Its shows that something belongs to *it*: "The dog wagged its tail." Expand the word to *it is*; if the sentence still makes sense, use it's.
The rule
- It’s is a contraction. The apostrophe replaces missing letters: it is or it has.
- Its is a possessive, like his, her and their. None of those take an apostrophe, and neither does its.
The test
Replace the word with it is (or it has) and read the sentence again.
| Sentence | Expanded | Answer |
|---|---|---|
| ___ going to be a long day. | It is going to be a long day. ✓ | it’s |
| The company changed ___ logo. | The company changed it is logo. ✗ | its |
| ___ been a pleasure. | It has been a pleasure. ✓ | it’s |
| Every city has ___ own character. | Every city has it is own character. ✗ | its |
Why people get it wrong
Almost every other possessive in English uses an apostrophe — the dog’s bowl, Sam’s car — so it’s looks as though it should mean “belonging to it”. But pronouns work differently: his, hers, ours, yours, theirs and its never take one.
There is no its’
Its’ is never correct. There is only its (possession) and it’s (it is, it has).
Checking a document
This is one error a spellchecker will not catch, because both spellings are real words. The quickest way to check a long document is to search it for it’s and try the expansion on each one — the editor’s find tool (⌘F or Ctrl+F) does this in a few seconds.