Russian grammar · the case system
The instrumental case in Russian
кем? чем? Instrument, company, becoming
The instrumental marks the tool the action is done with and, after с, the company it is done in. It also follows a family of verbs learners meet constantly, стать and заниматься first among them, and it colors the set expressions for times of day and seasons.
Aurélien CuvelierAug 10, 2026The endings, with a declined example per ending
| Masculine | -ом / -ем | столом · музеем · словарём |
|---|---|---|
| Feminine | -ой / -ей | сестрой · неделей |
| Neuter | -ом / -ем | окном · морем |
| Plural | -ами / -ями | столами · словарями · окнами |
The personal pronouns in this case
| я | мной |
|---|---|
| ты | тобой |
| он | им |
| она | ей |
| оно | им |
| мы | нами |
| вы | вами |
| они | ими |
When to use it
The instrument
писать ручкой (write with a pen), ехать поездом (go by train): no preposition needed.
Company with с
гулять с другом (walk with a friend), кофе с молоком (coffee with milk).
After стать, заниматься, гордиться
What you become, do or take pride in stands in the instrumental: стать врачом (become a doctor).
Times and seasons
утром (in the morning), вечером (in the evening), зимой (in winter): frozen instrumentals Russians use daily.
In a real sentence
Дети рисуют карандашом. The children are drawing with a pencil.
Watch out
The instrumental hides in plain sight inside everyday adverbs: утром (in the morning), вечером, ночью, весной, зимой are simply nouns standing in the bare instrumental. And professions take it after стать and работать: она работает учителем, she works as a teacher, no as required.
The other cases
- The nominative case in Russian
- The genitive case in Russian
- The dative case in Russian
- The accusative case in Russian
- The prepositional case in Russian
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Written by
Aurélien Cuvelier Founder, NuanceDeck
Aurélien Cuvelier builds NuanceDeck, the app that teaches Russian and French words in context. Each course follows the official proficiency word lists and a frequency corpus for its language, and every word comes with real, annotated example sentences.
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