German verbs

Verbs in German are more diverse than in English; in this page we will learn their categories, and the most used tenses in
German, note that this page is including only the important information you should know about in German verbs, and it doesnt
include details about each category or each tense.
German Verbs
In German verbs are categorized into three categories: weak verbs, strong, and mixed verbs.
Weak verbs (schwache Verben) do not change the stem vowel in the past tense and the past participle and theyre considered
like regular verbs in English, examples: arbeiten (to work), spielen (to play).
Strong verbs (starke Verben) do change the stem vowel in both the past tense and the past participle, examples: sprechen (to
speak), fahren (to drive, go)
Mixed verbs contain parts of both weak and strong verbs. Theyre used very often and therefore they should not be
overlooked, examples: bringen (to bring), senden (to send)

Some verbs in the 3 categories above may contain separable (trennbar) or inseparable (untrennbar) prefixes. The point of using
these prefixes is to create new meanings from the original verb. This concept is not strange to English, lets look at the verb to
stand if we add the prefix under it will give us a whole new verb to understand, the same thing in German, stehen means
to stand, verstehen means to understand. Easy, right! Well not exactly, because German uses these prefixes more often.
And some prefixes can be detached from the original verb and take a specific spot in the sentences, sometimes even far from the
verb.
Separable prefixes (trennbar) are (ab, bei, ein, vor, an, auf, mit, weg, etc.) can stand independently as words, or can stay
connected to the verb, Kann ich mitkommen? (Can I come with you?), kommen Sie mit ans Meer? (are you coming with to
the sea), here the verb is mitkommen, see how in the first example it was connected, and in the second example the prefix
mit was placed after Sie. The meaning of mitkommen is to accompany or come with.
The inseparable prefixes (untrennbar) are (be-, emp-, ent-, er-, ver-, zer-). These kind of prefixes cannot be removed from
their verbs, The most common inseparable prefix verbs are: verkaufen (to sell), bekommen (to get), empfangen (to receive),
empfehlen (to recommend), entdecken (to discover), verstehen (to understand), versagen (to fail), zerstren (to destroy).

German Tenses
Below you will find the most used tenses in German, with the verb endings in each tense, as well as some examples, try to
master them if you can, that would help you a lot and makes you feel comfortable expressing yourself in German, we will start
with the present tense, which is a very important and a must to learn tense:
Present Tense in German
Its the first tense we will learn, weak German verbs take the following endings
to form the present tense:
ich -e, du -st, er (sie, es) -t, wir -en, ihr -t, Sie -en, sie -en.
These endings can help you a lot, because with them you can conjugate mostof
weak verbs into the present tense, you only need the stem of the verb, for
example the stem of spielen (to play) is spiel.
Strong verbs change in the singular second person familiar
and third personforms, for example the verb nehmen to take, look at the side
of the table. Usually strong verbs changes are regular and
predictable: a becomes , ebecomes ie or i, au becomes u, o becomes . Note
that the plural form is regular.
Mixed verbs are irregular and are best learnt by heart, because theyre
unpredictable. The good news is that te most common conjugation is the one for
the weak verb. But like any other language there are some exceptions for all three
types of verbs.

Weak verb
spielen (to play)
ich spiele
du spielst (familiar)
er, sie, es spielt
wir spielen
ihr spielt (familiar)
Sie spielen (formal)
sie spielen

Strong verb
nehmen (to take)
ich nehme
du nimmst (familiar)
er, sie, es nimmt
wir nehmen
ihr nehmt (familiar)
Sie nehmen (formal)
sie nehmen

Now we will have a look at the past tense, also called the imperfect, another very important fact in knowing how to conjugate
verbs in German:
German Past Tense (Imperfect)
In German as well as in English the simple past tense (imperfect) is used to
describe past events, more literal than conversational, regularly used when
writing about the past. The endings for the weak verb are:
ich -te, du -test, Sie -ten, er (sie, es, man) -te, wir -ten, ihr -tet, Sie -ten, sie
-ten.
So just take any weak verb stem and add it to the endings above, for example our
previous verb spielen (to play), its stem is spiel, plus the endings above we will
get: ich spielte, du spieltest, er spielte, wir spielten, ihr spieltet, Sie, sie spielten
To form the past tense with strong verbs, the trickiest part is knowing thestem,
for example in English, you dont say I comed, but you say I came to refer to
the past of the verb to come, strong verbs in German change their stem vowels
and add the following endings:
ich (-nothing added to the stem), du -st, Sie -en, er, sie, es (-nothing added to
the stem), wir -en, ihr -t, Sie -en, sie -en. (look at the example on the side)
For the irregular verbs, theyre tricky too in forming their stem, sometimes the
stem doesnt look like the original verb at all, just like I go and I went, but
these German irregular verbs change the vowel in the stem and, in addition,
they take weak verb endings in the past tense.

Strong verb
kommen (to come)
ich kam
du kamst (familiar)
Sie kamen (formal)
er, sie, es kam
wir kamen
ihr kamt (familiar)
Sie kamen (formal)
sie kamen

Irregular verb
wissen (to know)
ich wusste
du wusstest (familiar)
Sie wussten (formal)
er, sie, es wusste
wir wussten
ihr wusstet (familiar)
Sie wussten (formal)
sie wussten

Now we will learn the future tense, which is considered the easiest, because you only need to learn the conjugated form of
werden plus the infinitive of the verbs you want to conjugate:
Future Tense in German
There are two ways to express the German future. The easiest and most common method is to use
thepresent tense with an appropriate time marker; Wir gehen morgen nach Berlin (were going to
Berlin tomorrow). The other method is to use the appropriate present tense form of werden with the
infinitive of the main verb, note that the main verb in this method comes at the end of the sentence,
relatively far from the future verb werden. Wir werden Schach und Kreuzwortrtsel spielen (we will
play chess and cross puzzels). Did you see how the verb spielen was kicked to the end of the sentence, its
like youre saying in English: we will chess and cross puzzles play. Remember this structure, because this
is how you will be forming verbs in the future if you use the verb werden with it.
Note that if you choose to use the first method, which is present tense you have to mention the time
marker such as morgen/ tomorrow, nchstes Jahr/ next yearnot using them will make people think
that youre talking about the present and not the future tense.

ich werde spielen

du wirst spielen
er, sie, es wird spielen
wir werden spielen
ihr werdet spielen
sie werden spielen
Sie werden spielen