There is / There are

We use There is and There are to show that something exists or is present in a location. There is is used with singular nouns and uncountable nouns, while There are is used with plural countable nouns. The word 'there' functions as a dummy subject and does not indicate location.

The structure is: There + is/are + noun phrase + (location). For questions, we invert the order: Is there...? / Are there...? For negatives, use There isn't or There is not / There aren't or There are not. Contractions: There's is common for There is, but There're is rarely used in standard English.

There is / There are can be used in multiple contexts: describing locations, stating quantities, expressing existence, and presenting new information. With uncountable nouns like water, money, or information, always use There is. Quantifiers such as some, any, many, much, a lot of, and numbers commonly appear with these structures.

When two noun phrases follow, match the verb with the first noun: There is a pen and three books (singular pen determines is). These structures work in different tenses: Present (is/are), Past (was/were), Future (will be). They are particularly useful in IELTS Writing Task 1 for describing charts and locations.

Several exceptions and special cases exist. When multiple nouns follow, the verb agrees with the first noun: There is a book and three pens. In informal speech, There's is sometimes incorrectly used with plurals, but this should be avoided in IELTS.

With no, use There is no... or There are no... which equals There isn't any..

or There aren't any... Negative questions (Isn't there...? / Aren't there...?) express surprise or expectation. Question tags follow the auxiliary: There is a solution, isn't there? There are problems, aren't there? Note the difference between Here is/are (near) and There is/are (distant or general existence).

In very formal writing, avoid contractions entirely.

• Bengali speakers commonly make specific errors with There is / There are.
• The most frequent mistake is subject-verb disagreement: using There is with plural nouns or There are with singular nouns.
• Another error is adding an unnecessary subject pronoun: It is a book there instead of There is a book.
• Some confuse It is (identification/description) with There is (existence): It is a book (this thing is a book) vs There is a book (a book exists).
• Word order errors occur when students translate directly from Bengali structure.
• Using have instead of There is/are is grammatically possible but less natural for existence statements.
• In IELTS, these mistakes lower Grammatical Range and Accuracy scores.
• Always check noun number before choosing is or are.