that's

See also: thats

English

Pronunciation

• (weak form) IPA^(key): /ðəts/
• IPA^(key): /ðæts/

• Audio (US):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -æts

Etymology 1

From that + 's (contraction of words ending in s).

Contraction

that's

1. That is.

   That's the book I've been looking for.

2. That has.

   I've managed to find the solution to the problem that's been bugging me all day.

3. (proscribed) That was.

   Yesterday, that's bugging me all day.

Alternative forms

• das, dat's (chiefly AAVE, MLE, Ireland)
• thass, thas, thazz, thash (dialect or representing slurred, drunken speech)
• thats (obsolete)

Etymology 2

From that +‎ -'s (possessive marker).

Determiner

that's

1. (West Midlands, Northern Ireland, Canada, US) whose, of which (in dialects that require a human antecedent for 'whose')
   • 1992, Jim Crace, Arcadia, page 10:

     He had in his pocket an old flick-knife that's spring was slow and temperamental.

   • 1993 January 10, Bill Vlasic, “Cool Contest”, in The Detroit News, page 1D:

     " […] we want them to bring a product to market that's time had not yet come," said Ray Farhung, a Southern California Edison official.

   • 1995, Aimo Seppänen & Göran Kjellmer. The dog that's leg was run over: On the genitive of the relative pronoun. English Studies 76, 389–400.
   • 2009, Doug Whitman, quoted in Neal Whitman, "We Don't Speak the Same Language" (blog post, 2011 March 23):

     […] the only one that's title has been released […]

   • 2014 March 28, Warren Maguire, “['That's'] Comments”, in Mark Liberman, Language Log‎^[1], archived from the original on 8 April 2014:

     that's is perfectly possible in my Northern Irish English dialect, e.g. "The cow that's calf was lost" is fine; "The cow whose calf was lost" is not so good as my dialect seems to require human reference for who, […]

   • 2018, Jimmy Im, "I shopped at Amazon's new 4-star-product store in New York City — here's why I wouldn't do it again", CNBC.com, 2018 September 28:

     It had products like a WiFi light bulb that's brightness and even color can be controlled via Smartphone.

Alternative forms

• thats

Anagrams

• shatt, taths, thats