---
title: icu-plural-forms
description: "An ICU plural does not have the forms of its language."
---

# `icu-plural-forms`

**Warning** · An ICU plural does not have the forms of its language.

`git8n check` reports this rule as a warning. It fails only past `--max-warnings`.

## Why it matters

An ICU plural picks a branch by the plural rules of the language. A form that the translation does not write shows the text of `other`, so a Polish « 5 elementów » becomes « 5 elementy ». A form that the language never uses is text that nobody reads.

## Invalid

`locales/en/common.json`

```json
{
  "items": "{count, plural, one {# item} other {# items}}"
}
```

`locales/pl/common.json`

```json
{
  "items": "{count, plural, one {# element} other {# elementu}}"
}
```

```text
$ git8n check --source en
locales/pl/common.json
  warning  common:items: the plural {count} has no few many.  icu-plural-forms

Read more:
  icu-plural-forms  https://git8n.sakuga.dev/docs/reference/rules/icu-plural-forms.html

0 errors, 1 warning in 2 files (en → pl, 1 key).
```

## Valid

`locales/en/common.json`

```json
{
  "items": "{count, plural, one {# item} other {# items}}"
}
```

`locales/pl/common.json`

```json
{
  "items": "{count, plural, one {# element} few {# elementy} many {# elementów} other {# elementu}}"
}
```

`locales/fr/common.json`

```json
{
  "items": "{count, plural, =0 {aucun article} =1 {# article} other {# articles}}"
}
```

```text
$ git8n check --source en
0 errors, 0 warnings in 3 files (en → fr, pl, 1 key).
```

## What to do

Write a branch for each form of the language, and delete the others. Polish needs `one`, `few`, `many` and `other`; Japanese needs `other` only. An exact branch such as `=0` is always allowed, and exact branches that hold all the numbers of a form replace it: `=1` replaces `one` in English, but not in French, where `one` is 0 and 1. A form that only a number past 9999 takes, such as the `many` of French, is allowed and not needed.

[All the rules](./index.md) · [The command `check`](../cli.md#check)