Take a shower or take the shower? (2025)

Which of these sounds naturally English?

a) Get undressed and go take a shower.

b) Get undressed and go take the shower.

A.

You'd use "the" if you were talking about it. Like "The shower is broken." Or "he's in the shower."

If I had to decide between the two, definitely A.

I've never heard the expression "take the shower". It's weird...

I could imagine myself say:

Trisia: Take your clothes off and take a shower.
Kid: Yeah, whatever...

After a couple of hours:

Trisia: Did you take a/that shower like I told you?

Since I've already talked about taking a shower, I would find it ok to say it both ways.

Or, if you're referring to the shower room, not to showering:

After soccer practice, boys, go straight to the showers, you'll stink.

I'd opt for (a) but there is the other way of saying it, which is:

Get undressed and go and have a shower

The above version is more BE while the form take a shower is more AE.

Both are perfectly acceptable.

If you say "take the shower" I imagine someone bringing a shower in their car when they go camping.

Interesting, but very unusual.

NickJunior said:

Which of these sounds naturally English?

a) Get undressed and go take a shower.

b) Get undressed and go take the shower.

Click to expand...

Nick,

"Take a shower" is an idiomatic phrase that is always "take a shower" and never "take the shower."

You'll see the same with the phrase "take a break." It's never "take the break."

The verb "take" is one of those little verbs that take up several columns in the dictionary, because of its idiomatic applications -- and not just in English, either.

Ultimately you'll just have to memorize the phrase. It doesn't work to try to analyze it with conventional syntax. Conventionally, you can take a car to the store or you can take the car to the store. But "take a car" isn't an idiom. That's the difference.

Hope that helps.

coiffe said:

"Take a shower" is an idiomatic phrase that is always "take a shower" and never "take the shower."

You'll see the same with the phrase "take a break." It's never "take the break."

The verb "take" is one of those little verbs that take up several columns in the dictionary, because of its idiomatic applications -- and not just in English, either.

Click to expand...

Does this also apply to "have a shower" or "have/take a bath"? Thanks in advance.

heypresto said:

In BE, I think we usually 'have' a bath, but I can't speak for AE.

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Thank you but actually, my question was about using "a" or "the".

Can we say these ones?

I'm taking bath now.
I'm having bath now.

or

I'm having shower now.
I'm taking shower now.

You could use 'the' only if 'bath' has been mentioned before.

Did you have the bath you said you were going to have?

nh01 said:

I'm taking bath now.
I'm having bath now.

or

I'm having shower now.
I'm taking shower now.

Click to expand...

No to all of these.

boozer said:

Someone: Take off your clothes and go take the shower.
Me: I can easily take it with my clothes on. What will you have me do with it?

Click to expand...

My reaction as well.

nh01 said:

{...}
I'm taking bath now.
I'm having bath now.

or

I'm having shower now.
I'm taking shower now.

Click to expand...

Incorrect. It should be

I'm taking a bath now.
I'm having a bath now.

or

I'm having a shower now.
I'm taking a shower now.

Which of these sounds naturally English?

a) Get undressed and go take a shower.

b) Get undressed and go take the shower.

Neither its "have a shower"

Take sounds as if you are moving the shower elsewhere

[Side comment removed. DonnyB - moderator]

That said, it seems to me that

• Get undressed and go take a shower.

is
(1) fine in AmE, as the preceding posts indicate;
and
(2) perfectly understandable in BrE.

It's

• Get undressed and go take the shower.

which would prompt the question "Where?"

grumpyaudeman said:

I say
Get undressed and have a shower.
) Get undressed and have a shower.
I am 68 English and you asked what sounds naturally English?

Click to expand...

We take showers in the U.S. where about 230 million of us speak English as our first language.

NickJunior's original 2007 question was about "take a shower" vs "take the shower".

Today's question from nh01 was about whether the verb take/have was followed by "a shower/bath" or "the shower/bath" or just "shower/bath".

The answer is the same: normally, we use the indefinite article "a".

NickJunior said:

Which of these sounds naturally English?

a) Get undressed and go take a shower.

b) Get undressed and go take the shower.

Click to expand...

take a shower is a metaphor; it means to clean oneself with water (and presumably with soap too).
take the shower refers to the place (stall or bath) where you clean yourself with water.

So, they are used differently.

SevenDays said:

take a shower is a metaphor; it means to clean oneself with water (and presumably with soap too).
take the shower refers to the place (stall or bath) where you clean yourself with water.

So, they are used differently.

Click to expand...

I've never heard anyone use version (2) in BE in the way you're suggesting there: it doesn't work at all for me.

People over here do sometimes use the AE expression "hit the shower". Perhaps that's what you're thinking of.

Loob said:

I understood SevenDays to be suggesting that "Take the shower" meannt "Take the shower fitment (from place A to place B)".
Which is, I think, what we're all saying.

Click to expand...

Right; in a game show, after you've won, and you have a choice:

Contestant, as your winning prize, do you take the shower over here, or this brand new Rolls Royce!!!

I'm sure we would all take the shower