Questions & Answers about Эта подписка платная.
- Эта – demonstrative pronoun/adjective: this (feminine, singular, nominative).
- подписка – noun: subscription (feminine, singular, nominative).
- платная – short-form adjective: paid / not free / requiring payment (feminine, singular, nominative, predicate form).
So grammatically it’s literally “This subscription paid (is).” The verb “is” is just omitted in Russian.
In Russian, the verb быть (to be) is normally dropped in the present tense when you say “X is Y”.
So:
- Эта подписка платная. = This subscription is paid / not free.
You would normally not say есть here.
Using есть (Эта подписка есть платная) sounds either wrong or very unnatural in modern Russian.
They all mean some form of “this”, but they agree with the noun’s gender and number:
эта – feminine singular nominative (used with feminine nouns):
- эта подписка – this subscription
- эта книга – this book
этот – masculine singular nominative (used with masculine nouns):
- этот фильм – this film
- этот сайт – this site
это – neuter singular nominative, and also the general “this/it is”:
- это окно – this window
- Это подписка. – This is a subscription.
Since подписка is feminine, you must say эта подписка, not это подписка when “this” directly modifies the noun.
Подписка is in the nominative singular: подписка.
Reason: this is a simple equational sentence “X is Y”. Both X and Y (subject and predicate noun/adjective) are typically in the nominative:
- Эта подписка (subject, nominative)
- платная (predicate adjective, nominative, feminine singular to agree with подписка)
So nothing is being “acted on” here, so no accusative, genitive, etc.
Because платная is an adjective in the feminine singular nominative, agreeing with подписка:
- Feminine nominative singular adjective endings: usually -ая or -яя
- новая подписка – a new subscription
- платная подписка – a paid subscription
Here it’s used as a predicate adjective (after the implied “is”), but it still matches подписка in gender and number:
- Эта подписка платная. – This subscription is paid/not free.
These three words are different parts of speech:
платная – adjective (short-form here), feminine singular:
- Эта подписка платная. – This subscription is paid / not free.
платно – adverb or short neuter predicate form:
- Здесь всё платно. – Everything here costs money / is paid.
- You’d use this when describing a situation or service in general, not a specific feminine noun like подписка.
платит – verb (3rd person singular of платить, “to pay”):
- Он платит. – He pays.
- Not used to say “the subscription is paid”; it describes an action someone performs.
In Эта подписка платная, we are describing a property of the subscription (adjective), not an action (verb) and not a general “it is paid here” situation (adverb).
In this context, платная means:
- “not free”,
- “requires payment”,
- “offered for a fee”.
It does not usually mean “already paid for by someone”.
So Эта подписка платная is more naturally:
- This subscription costs money.
- This subscription isn’t free.
For “already paid (for)” you’d usually specify who paid, or use a different construction.
Both are correct but have different typical uses:
платная подписка – “a paid subscription” as an ordinary description before the noun:
- У нас есть платная подписка. – We have a paid subscription.
подписка платная – used as a full statement with an (implied) “is”:
- Эта подписка платная. – This subscription is paid / not free.
So:
- Before a noun: платная подписка.
- As the main information in a sentence: подписка платная.
You change both the demonstrative and the adjective to plural:
- Эти подписки платные. – These subscriptions are paid / not free.
Changes:
- эта → эти (feminine singular → plural “these”)
- подписка → подписки (singular → plural)
- платная → платные (feminine singular adjective → plural adjective)
Stress marks: Э́та подписка́ пла́тная.
Approximate pronunciation (Latin letters):
- Эта – E-ta (stress on Э; like “E” in “met” but a bit clearer)
- подписка – pad-PEES-ka (stress on И; the first о is pronounced more like a in unstressed position)
- платная – PLAT-na-ya (stress on а in the first syllable)
Put it together: E-ta pad-PEES-ka PLAT-na-ya.
The main everyday meaning is “subscription” (to a service, magazine, app, etc.):
- подписка на журнал – magazine subscription
- подписка на сервис – subscription to a service
It can also mean:
- подписка о невыезде – a legal undertaking not to leave (in legal contexts)
But in modern everyday usage, especially online or in apps, подписка almost always means subscription.
Russian doesn’t have a / an / the, so эта just means “this”, and context fills in the rest.
- In most contexts this will correspond to “This subscription is not free” in English.
- Whether you translate as “this subscription” or “the subscription” in English depends on the situation, not on any extra Russian word.
But grammatically, эта specifically points to “this”, not just any subscription.
You use the opposite adjective бесплатный (“free, at no cost”):
- Эта подписка бесплатная. – This subscription is free.
Here бесплатная is the feminine singular form to agree with подписка, just like платная.