German Regular Verbs
Present Tense Verb Conjugations
Part of Lesson 4b of German for Beginners
Also see: Past Tense Conjugations of regular verbs
The regular German verbs follow a predictable pattern in the present tense. Once you learn the pattern for one regular German verb, you know how all German verbs are conjugated. (Yes, there are irregular verbs that don't always follow the rules, but even they will usually have the same endings as the regular verbs.) The majority of German verbs are regular, even though it may not seem that way, since many commonly used verbs are strong (irregular) verbs.
The chart below lists two sample regular German verbs. All regular German verbs will follow the same pattern. We have also included a helpful list of the more common stem-changing verbs. These are verbs that follow the normal pattern of endings, but have a vowel change in their stem or base form (hence the name "stem-changing"). The verb endings for each pronoun are indicated in bold type.
Each verb has a basic infinitive (to) form. This is the form of the verb you find in a German dictionary. The verb to play in English is the infinitive form. (He plays is a conjugated form.) The German equivalent of to play is spielen. Each verb also has a stem form, the basic part of the verb left after you remove the -en ending. For spielen the stem is spiel- (spielen - en). To conjugate the verb that is, use it in a sentenceyou must add the correct ending to the stem. If you want to say I play you add an -e ending: ich spiele (which can also be translated into English as I am playing). Each person (he, you, they, etc.) requires its own ending on the verb. This is called conjugating the verb.
If you don't know how to conjugate verbs correctly it means your German will sound strange to people who understand the language. German verbs require more endings for the various persons than English verbs. In English we use only an s ending or no ending for most verbs: I/they/we/you play or he/she plays. German has a different ending for almost all of those verb situations: ich spiele, sie spielen, du spielst, er spielt, etc. Observe that the verb spielen has a different ending in most of the examples in the chart below. If you want to sound intelligent in German, you need to learn when to use which ending. That's why we have this chart for you!
|SPIELEN / TO PLAY
Present Tense - Präsens
|ich spiele||I play||Ich spiele gern Basketball.|
|du spielst||you (fam.)
|Spielst du Schach? (chess)|
|er spielt||he plays||Er spielt mit mir. (with me)|
|sie spielt||she plays||Sie spielt Karten. (cards)|
|es spielt||it plays||Es spielt keine Rolle. (It doesn't matter.)|
|wir spielen||we play||Wir spielen Basketball.|
|ihr spielt||you (guys) play||Spielt ihr Monoploy?|
|sie spielen||they play||Sie spielen Golf.|
|Sie spielen||you play||Spielen Sie heute? (Sie, formal "you," is both singular and plural.)|
Verb Stem Ends in -d or -t
Connecting -e examples
Applies only to du, ihr, and er/sie/es
|er arbeitet||Arbeitest du heute?|
|du findest||Findet ihr das?|
|Also see related verb links/pages below.|
Now let's look at another kind of German verb, a stem-changing verb. Technically, sprechen (to speak) is a strong verb, not a regular verb. But in the present tense the verb sprechen is regular except for a stem change from e to i. That is, the verb changes its stem vowel, but the endings are the same as for any other regular verb in the present tense. Note that all stem changes only occur with the singular pronouns/persons du and the third person singular (er, sie, es). The first person singular (ich) and all the plural forms do NOT change. (Other stem-changing verb patterns include a to ä and e to ie. See the examples below.) Stem vowel changes are indicated below in red and a lighter background. Note that the verb endings remain normal.
|SPRECHEN / TO SPEAK
Present Tense - Präsens
|ich spreche||I speak||Ich spreche am Telefon.|
|du sprichst||you (fam.) speak||Sprichst du am Telefon?|
|er spricht||he speaks||Er spricht mit mir. (with me)|
|sie spricht||she speaks||Sie spricht Italienisch.|
|es spricht||it speaks||Es spricht laut. (loudly)|
|wir sprechen||we speak||Wir sprechen Deutsch.|
|ihr sprecht||you (guys) speak||Sprecht ihr Englisch?|
|sie sprechen||they speak||Sie sprechen Italienisch.|
|Sie sprechen||you speak||Sprechen Sie Spanisch? (Sie, formal "you," is both singular and plural.)|
|QUIZ on the present tense.|
|Other Stem-Changing Verbs|
|fahren||drive, travel||er fährt, du fährst|
|geben||to give||es gibt, du gibst|
|lesen||to read||er liest, du liest|
|Note: These stem-changing verbs are strong (irregular) verbs, but they have regular verb endings in the present tense. See Strong Verbs for more about irregular German verbs.|
Quiz: Present Tense
A self-scoring quiz on German verbs in the present tense.
German Strong (Irregular) Verbs
The principal parts and conjugations of German irregular verbs, including haben and sein.
Verb Review 1
Part One of a 3-part look at the ins and outs of German verbs. With self-scoring quiz.
> Back to Lesson 4b (Lektion 4b)
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German Regular Verbs in the Past Tense
The principal parts and conjugations of German regular verbs in the simple past and present perfect.
German Strong (Irregular) Verbs
The principal parts and conjugations of German irregular verbs, including "haben" and "sein."
German Verbs - Contents
Links to all of our verb resources and lessons on German verb conjugation.
All of the annotated glossaries on this site - from aerospace to travel.
All of the grammar resources on this site.
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