avonds

Avonds is a Dutch noun meaning the period of time after the afternoon and before night, commonly referred to as the evening. In modern Dutch, the standard plural is avonden. Avonds as a plural form is generally considered nonstandard or a misspelling, and authors should use avonden when talking about multiple evenings. The word is related to the singular avond and to the German Abend, both tracing back to the same Germanic root for the daily time division.

A frequent and correct construction involving a related form is the contracted adverbial phrase ’s avonds, meaning in the evenings or during the evening. This is a common time reference in everyday language and in schedules, and it is always written with an apostrophe and a space before the s: ’s avonds. For example, one might say, “We zien elkaar ’s avonds,” or, “De voorstelling begint ’s avonds.” This expression does not use the plural avonden and should be treated as a separate grammatical item.

Usage notes emphasize the distinction between counting occurrences and describing time. Avonden is used when referring to multiple discrete evenings (e.g., “drie avonden.”). The form avonds is not standard for pluralization and should be avoided in formal writing. In fixed phrases, the standard adverbial form is ’s avonds.

See also: avond, avonden, ’s avonds, Dutch time expressions.