German Verb Conjugation: The Honest Guide to Actually Learning This Stuff

Look, I get it. You opened this page because you're staring at German verb conjugation tables and your brain is turning to mush. Maybe you've been trying to memorize endings for weeks. Maybe your textbook makes it all seem way more complicated than it needs to be. Maybe you just want someone to tell you what actually matters and what you can safely ignore for now.

Here's the thing about German verb conjugation: it's not nearly as hard as people make it seem. German has around 200 irregular verbs. English has closer to 300. And unlike English, German verb conjugation actually follows patterns. Once you see those patterns, everything clicks.

So let's cut through the noise.

What German verb conjugation actually means

Every verb in German changes its form depending on who's doing the action and when they're doing it. The verb "spielen" (to play) becomes "ich spiele" when you're talking about yourself, "du spielst" when you're talking to a friend, and "er spielt" when talking about some guy.

This is conjugation. The verb changes to show who and when.

The good news? German only uses four main endings in the present tense: -e, -st, -t, and -en. That's it. Four endings cover almost everything you need for regular verbs in the present tense.

See how "wir" and "sie/Sie" just use the infinitive form? You basically already know two conjugations. And "er/sie/es" and "ihr" share the same ending. So really, you're learning three new endings: -e, -st, and -t.

The three types of German verbs you need to know

Weak verbs (the easy ones)

Most German verbs are "weak" verbs. These follow the rules exactly. You take the stem (the infinitive minus -en), add the appropriate ending, and you're done. No surprises. No exceptions.

lernen (to learn) → lern + endings

machen (to make/do) → mach + endings

If every German verb worked like this, you'd be done reading now.

Strong verbs (the ones that change their vowel)

Here's where it gets interesting. Strong verbs—there are about 200 of them—change their vowel in certain forms. This vowel change is called "Ablaut" if you want to sound smart, but really it just means the vowel in the middle shifts around.

The patterns are pretty consistent:

e → i change:

e → ie change:

a → ä change:

Notice something? The vowel only changes for du and er/sie/es. The other forms stay normal. That's a pattern you can rely on.

Mixed verbs (a bit of both)

Mixed verbs are the weird middle children. They conjugate like weak verbs in the present tense but do irregular things in the past. Examples include bringen (to bring), denken (to think), and wissen (to know).

For now, just know they exist. You'll pick them up naturally as you encounter them.

The verbs you actually need to master first

Before you go memorizing verb tables, focus on these. They show up constantly:

sein (to be) - completely irregular

This one doesn't follow any pattern. Just memorize it.

haben (to have) - mostly regular but important

Notice how "du" loses the 'b' (hast, not habst) and "er/sie/es" also loses it (hat, not habt). Small quirks, but you need to know them because haben shows up everywhere—especially when forming the past tense.

werden (to become / will)

This verb does triple duty: it means "to become," it forms the future tense, and it creates the passive voice. Worth knowing well.

German tenses: what to focus on first

German has six tenses, but here's a secret: for speaking German day-to-day, you really only need two.

Present tense (Präsens)

You already learned this above. Use it for:

That last one is important. Germans constantly use present tense with a time expression instead of bothering with the future tense. Much easier.

Present perfect (Perfekt) - the spoken past tense

This is what Germans actually use when talking about the past. Not the simple past (Präteritum)—that's mostly for writing and storytelling. In normal conversation, Perfekt is king.

Structure: haben or sein (conjugated) + past participle (at the end)

Ich habe ein Buch gelesen. (I read/have read a book.) Sie ist nach Berlin gefahren. (She went/has gone to Berlin.)

To form the past participle:

When to use haben vs. sein:

Use sein for:

Use haben for basically everything else.

This is one of the trickiest parts for English speakers because we only use "have" for the past. Germans split it up. But once you get used to it, it's actually pretty logical—verbs that involve movement or changing state use sein.

Modal verbs: the six you need

Modal verbs express ability, permission, obligation, and desire. German has six of them, and they work differently than regular verbs.

Notice that ich and er/sie/es forms are identical. That's unique to modal verbs.

When you use a modal verb, the main verb goes to the end of the sentence in its infinitive form:

Ich kann Deutsch sprechen. (I can speak German.) Du musst jetzt gehen. (You have to go now.)

One thing that trips people up: müssen nicht doesn't mean "must not." It means "don't have to." If you want to say someone is forbidden from doing something, use dürfen nicht:

Separable verbs: when the prefix goes to the end

German loves taking a verb and sticking a prefix on it to create a new meaning. Sometimes that prefix stays attached. Sometimes it detaches and flies to the end of the sentence.

aufstehen (to get up) → Ich stehe um 7 Uhr auf. anfangen (to begin) → Wir fangen morgen an. einkaufen (to shop) → Er kauft im Supermarkt ein.

Common separable prefixes: ab-, an-, auf-, aus-, ein-, mit-, nach-, vor-, zu-, zurück-

The prefix separates in:

The prefix stays attached when:

Inseparable prefixes never detach: be-, emp-, ent-, er-, ge-, miss-, ver-, zer-

verstehen → Ich verstehe das. (NOT: Ich stehe das ver.)

The future tense (if you really want it)

Honestly? Most Germans just use the present tense with a time word for future events. But if you want to express the future more formally or make predictions, here's how:

werden (conjugated) + infinitive (at the end)

Ich werde morgen ins Kino gehen. (I will go to the cinema tomorrow.) Es wird morgen regnen. (It will rain tomorrow.)

That's it. Conjugate werden, put the main verb at the end. The future tense in German is genuinely one of the easier grammatical structures because werden does all the heavy lifting.

Common conjugation mistakes to avoid

After reading a lot about how Noah learned 34k German words, one thing becomes clear: learning from real German content matters more than memorizing tables. But here are the mistakes that trip people up most:

1. Wrong auxiliary verb Using haben when you need sein (or vice versa). "Ich habe gegangen" is wrong. It's "Ich bin gegangen."

2. Forgetting stem vowel changes Saying "du fahrst" instead of "du fährst." The a → ä pattern only happens for du and er/sie/es, but it always happens for those verbs.

3. Mixing up dürfen and müssen negation "Du musst nicht" means you don't have to, not that you're forbidden.

4. Putting the past participle in the wrong place In German, the participle goes at the end: "Ich habe das Buch gelesen," not "Ich habe gelesen das Buch."

5. Separating inseparable verbs Verstehen, bekommen, erklären—these never split. You'll just have to memorize which prefixes detach and which don't.

How to actually learn German verb conjugation

Here's what doesn't work: staring at conjugation tables until your eyes bleed. Your brain isn't wired to memorize grids of information. It's wired to recognize patterns in context.

What does work:

1. Learn verbs in sentences, not isolation

Don't learn "geben, gab, gegeben." Learn "Ich gebe dir das Buch" and "Er hat mir ein Geschenk gegeben." Your brain remembers stories and contexts, not lists.

2. Focus on patterns, not individual verbs

Once you know that e → i happens for geben, you can predict it happens for essen, helfen, sprechen, and others. Group verbs by their patterns and learn one verb from each group well.

3. Prioritize Perfekt over Präteritum

Unless you're reading novels or formal texts, Perfekt is what you need for past tense in German conversation. Don't waste time memorizing simple past forms for every verb.

4. Get lots of input

This is where most people go wrong. They try to learn conjugation before they've heard enough German to have intuition about what sounds right. Reading and listening to German content builds that intuition. Conjugation rules start to feel natural when you've heard "Ich habe gesehen" a hundred times in real contexts.

If you want to go deeper on how spaced repetition works for language learning, we've written about that too. The key insight: spread your learning out over time instead of cramming.

Once you've got verb conjugation basics down, you'll want to start picking up some German slang to sound more natural. Because nobody actually talks like a textbook.

If you're looking to learn German from real content instead of textbook exercises, Migaku is built exactly for that. The browser extension lets you watch German Netflix shows and YouTube videos with interactive subtitles—click any word to see its definition, conjugation info, and example sentences. When you encounter a verb form you don't recognize, you see it in context, not in a table.

The mobile app syncs with everything so you can review vocabulary on the go using spaced repetition. Every word you save from shows, videos, or articles becomes a flashcard that comes back at the optimal time for retention. You're not memorizing conjugation tables in a vacuum—you're reinforcing verb forms you actually encountered while watching Dark or listening to German podcasts.

Honestly, this is how conjugation finally sticks. You see "er hat gesagt" in a show, look it up, add it to your reviews, and suddenly you've internalized that past participle without sitting down to "study grammar." Do that a few hundred times across different verbs, and the patterns become second nature.

There's a 10-day free trial if you want to see how it works. No credit card required.

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