Days or Day’s (Legal Writing And Grammar)

What is the difference between Days or Day’s?

Which one should you use in contracts or legal writing?

What is the correct grammar?

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Days or Day’s 

Have you ever wondered how you should write the word “day” in contracts or legal notices?

Should you write “ten days’ notice” or “ten day’s notice”?

What is the correct grammar for days or day’s?

Should you say:

• 30 days notice
• 30 day’s notice
• 30 days’ notice

The question comes down to whether or not you must put an apostrophe after the word day?

Some argue that putting an apostrophe after the word day indicates a possessive as if the “day” will own the notice period.

The proper way of writing day’s or days is “30 days’ notice” where the apostrophe comes after the letter “s”.

Indicating 30 days’ notice is the equivalent of saying “notice of 30 days”.

Days’ or Day’s

What is the correct punctuation of the days’ or day’s in a sentence?

Is it:

• Day’s notice
• Days’ notice

The answer comes down to whether you are looking to write something in the possessive or in the plural form.

If you are looking to write a sentence where the possessive form is used, you’ll use the word “day’s”.

If you are looking to use the plural possessive form, you’ll use “days’”.

Days or Day’s Grammar

Should you use “days” or “day’s” in a sentence?

The word “days” is here the plural form of the word “day”.

The word “day’s” is the possessive form of the word “day”.

You’ll use the word day without an apostrophe when you refer to the word ‘day’ in plural like “there are many days in a year”.

You’ll use the apostrophe followed by the “s” when you are referring to one measure of time like “a day’s notice”.

Day’s or Day’s Notice 

When you are referring to a “notice”, should you use days vs day’s?

To refer to a notice period of one day long, you’d say “one day’s notice” and not “one day notice”.

To refer to many days of notice period, you’d say “ten days’ notice” and not “ten day’s notice”.

Inanimate Possessive

The use of an apostrophe in “days’ or day’s” deals with the notion of inanimate possessives in the English language.

In the English, there are two reasons why you use an apostrophe:

• To show contractions (is or isn’t)
• To indicate a possession (John’s car)

When using the apostrophe to refer to time and measurements, we can say:

• A day’s notice
• 30 days’ notice

When you refer to one day, you’ll use the singular form of day with the apostrophe after.

When you are referring to many days of notice, you’ll use the plural form of day and then the apostrophe.

Example In a Sentence

Let’s look at an example in a sentence to illustrate the point better.

Where should you put the apostrophe if you want to write three days of work.

Would you say:

• Three day’s work
• Three days’ work
• Three days work

The correct option is the second one.

The second option is the equivalent of “three days of work”.

Since you are referring to many days of work, you want to use the plural of the word “day” and you’ll put the apostrophe after so you distinguish it from the singular form.

Examples In Legal Writing 

Let’s look at the use of the word days, day’s and days’ in legal writing to nuance them.

Example 1: Days

Example 2: Day’s

Example 3: Days’

Takeaways 

So what is the legal definition of Days or Day’s?

Let’s look at a summary of our findings.

Days or Day’s

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