У меня всего один брат.

I have only one brother.

Breakdown of У меня всего один брат.

• я: I
• брат: the brother
• один: one
• всего: only

Questions & Answers about У меня всего один брат.

What does У меня literally mean, and why is it used to say I have?

Literally, у меня means “at me / by me / with me.”

Russian usually doesn’t use a direct verb like English to have in everyday speech. Instead, it uses the structure:

• у + [person in genitive case] + (есть) + [thing in nominative]

So:

• У меня (есть) брат. → literally “At me (there is) a brother.” → “I have a brother.”
• У Пети (есть) машина. → “Petya has a car.”

This у + genitive construction is the normal, neutral way to express possession in Russian, especially for people and everyday objects.

What grammatical case is меня, and why is that case used here?

Меня is the genitive form of я (I).

Personal pronouns:

• я → у меня
• ты → у тебя
• он → у него
• она → у неё
• мы → у нас
• вы → у вас
• они → у них

The preposition у (at, by, with) always takes the genitive case. Because we use у + genitive to express possession, я must change to genitive меня:

• у + я → у меня
• у + ты → у тебя, etc.

That is why it is у меня, not у я.

Where is the verb in this sentence? Why is there no есть?

The “hidden” verb is есть (the existential to be / there is), but in modern Russian it is often omitted.

Full, explicit version:

• У меня есть один брат. – I have one brother.

In the present tense, Russian often drops the verb to be:

• Я студент. – I am a student. (no verb in Russian)
• У меня один брат. – I have one brother. (no есть)

You usually include есть only when you want to emphasize the presence/existence of something, especially in contrast:

• У меня есть брат. (I do have a brother – maybe someone thought you didn’t.)
• У меня нет брата. (I don’t have a brother.)

In У меня всего один брат., the focus is on the quantity (only one), so есть is naturally dropped.

You can say У меня есть всего один брат, but it sounds more contrastive: “I do have a brother, but it’s only one.”

What exactly does всего add to the meaning? How is it different from только or from leaving it out?

Without всего:

• У меня один брат. – I have one brother. (neutral statement of fact)

With всего:

• У меня всего один брат. – I have only one brother. / I have just one brother.

Всего here means only / just / a total of and emphasizes that one is a small number. It often implies something like:

• “That’s really not many.”
• “I might have expected more, but in fact it’s only one.”

Compared with только:

• У меня только один брат. – I only have one brother.
• У меня всего один брат. – I have only one brother (that’s all / not more).

They are very close in meaning and often interchangeable. Nuances:

• только – general only, very common and neutral.
• всего – highlights the small total amount; can sound slightly more emotional or expressive, especially in speech.

If you remove всего and say У меня один брат, you lose that “only/just” nuance; it becomes a plain factual I have one brother.

Why is it один брат and not одного брата?

Один брат is in the nominative case, and that is exactly what we need here.

In the construction У меня (есть) X, the possessed thing (X) is grammatically the subject of an existential sentence:

• literally: “At me is one brother.”
• Russian structure: [location in genitive] + (есть) + [subject in nominative]

So:

• У меня один брат. – один брат = nominative (subject)
• У Пети два брата. – два брата = “two brothers” (see next question for case)

Одного брата is genitive or accusative singular masculine. It appears in different contexts, for example:

• У меня нет ни одного брата. – I don’t have a single brother. (genitive after нет)
• Я люблю одного брата больше. – I like one brother more. (accusative after любить)

But after У меня (есть) the default is nominative → один брат, not одного брата.

How would I say I only have two/three/five brothers using the same pattern?

Use у меня + всего + number + брат in the correct form for that number.

Key pattern with брат (brother):

• 2, 3, 4 → брата (genitive singular)
• 5 and higher → братьев (genitive plural)

Examples:

• У меня всего два брата. – I only have two brothers.
• У меня всего три брата. – I only have three brothers.
• У меня всего четыре брата. – I only have four brothers.
• У меня всего пять братьев. – I only have five brothers.

So the structure of your original sentence is:

• У меня всего один брат. – nominative (because один behaves like an adjective),
  but for 2, 3, 4 we switch to брата, and for 5+ to братьев.

Can I say Я имею всего одного брата instead? Is that natural?

It is grammatically correct, but in ordinary conversation it sounds unnatural and overly formal.

• Я имею всего одного брата. – literally I have only one brother, with иметь
  • accusative одного брата.

In real-life, everyday Russian, people almost always use у меня… to express possession:

• У меня всего один брат. ✅ natural
• Я имею всего одного брата. ⚠️ grammatically OK but sounds like legal/official language or a very old-fashioned style.

The verb иметь is usually used in:

• formal contexts: иметь право (to have the right), иметь возможность (to have the opportunity),
• set phrases: это не имеет значения (this doesn’t matter).

So for family members and normal possessions, prefer У меня….

Does the sentence change if the speaker is a woman?

No, it stays exactly the same:

• У меня всего один брат.

Nothing in this sentence agrees with the speaker’s gender:

• меня is the same for male and female.
• There is no past-tense verb (which would show gender).
• брат is masculine because it refers to a male person, not because of the speaker.

So both a man and a woman will say У меня всего один брат.

Can I move the words around, like Всего один брат у меня or У меня один всего брат?

Russian word order is flexible, but not all permutations sound natural.

1. У меня всего один брат.
   – This is the most neutral and natural order.

2. Всего один брат у меня.
   – This is also possible. It puts strong emphasis on “only one brother”, almost like:
   “Only one brother is what I have.”
   Sounds more emotional/expressive, sometimes poetic.

3. У меня один всего брат.
   – This sounds very odd to native speakers.
   Normally, всего (like только, лишь) should be placed right before the word or phrase it modifies, here один. Splitting them as один всего is not standard, especially in this short sentence.

4. У меня один брат всего.
   – Possible in some colloquial contexts, with a nuance like “…that’s all,” but it’s less neutral than У меня всего один брат.

For learners, the best and safest choice is:

• У меня всего один брат.

How do you pronounce У меня всего один брат correctly, and where is the stress?

Stressed vowels (in caps) and rough English-style transcription:

• У – like oo in boot: u
• меня́ – me-NYÁ → mi-nYÁ (stress on -ня́)
• всего́ – fsyé-VÓ → fsʲi-VÓ (stress on -во́)
  
  • Note: written with г, but pronounced with a v sound; you don’t hear a hard g.
• один – a-DEEN → a-DÍN (stress on -дин)
• брат – like English brat but with a rolled/flapped r, final т is pronounced.

Putting it together with main stresses:

• У меня́ всего́ оди́н брат.
  Approximate pronunciation: u mi-nYÁ fsʲi-VÓ a-DÍN brat.