German verbs

German verbs may be classified as either weak, with a dental consonant inflection, or strong, showing a vowel gradation. Both of these are regular systems. Most verbs of both types are regular, though various subgroups and anomalies do arise; however, textbooks for learners often class all strong verbs as irregular. The only completely irregular verb in the language is sein. There are more than 200 strong and irregular verbs, but just as in English, there is a gradual tendency for strong verbs to become weak.
As German is a Germanic language, the German verbs can be understood historically as a development of the Germanic verbs.

Bare infinitives

The bare infinitive consists of the root and the suffix -en. With verbs whose roots end in el or er, the e of the infinitive suffix is dropped.

Prefixes

General overview of the most common German prefixes with their literal English translation

Aspect prefixes

Prefixes that indicate aspect, result, or combinatorial/additional meaning

Prefix	Verb	Literal meaning	English meaning
auf-	legen	to lay up	to place on; to apply
aus-	legen	to lay out	to lay out; to display; to interpret
bei-	legen	to lay beside	to add; to enclose
dar-	legen	to lay there	to explain; to set forth
ein-	legen	to lay in	to insert; to inlay
nach-	legen	to lay after	to add more
nieder-	legen	to lay down	to lay down; to resign
über-	legen	to lay over	to consider; to reflect
vor-	legen	to lay for	to present; to submit
weg-	legen	to lay away	to put away; to remove
zusammen-	legen	to lay together	to pool something

Directional / Motion Prefixes

Prefixes that indicate spatial movement or direction.

Prefix	Verb	Literal gloss	English meaning
hin	legen	to lay downward there	to lie down
her	legen	to lay downward here	to put something here
hinein	legen	to lay inside there	to put into a container
hinaus	legen	to lay outwards	to lie out in the sun

Transformative prefixes

''Prefixes that indicate change, intensity, creative/destructive process, or strong meaning shift''

Inseparable prefixes

There are some verbs which have a permanent prefix at their beginning. These prefixes are never stressed. The most common permanent prefixes found in German are ver-, ge-, be-, er-, ent-, and zer-.
The meaning of the permanent prefixes does not have a real system; the alteration in meaning can be subtle or drastic. The prefixes ver-, be- and ge- have several different meanings, although ge- is uncommon and often the root verb is no longer in existence. be- often makes a transitive verb from an intransitive verb. Verbs with er- tend to relate to creative processes, verbs with ent- usually describe processes of removing, and zer- is used for destructive actions. Ver- often describes some kind of extreme or excess of the root verb, although not in any systematic way: 'sprechen', for example means to 'speak', but 'versprechen', 'to promise' as in 'to give one's word' and 'fallen', meaning 'to fall' but 'verfallen', 'to decay' or 'to be ruined'.

Separable prefixes

Many verbs have a separable prefix that changes the meaning of the root verb, but that does not always remain attached to the root verb. When attached, these prefixes are always stressed. German sentence structure normally places verbs in second position or final position. For separable prefix verbs, the prefix always appears in final position. If a particular sentence's structure places the entire verb in final position then the prefix and root verb appear together. If a sentence places the verb in second position then only the root verb will appear in second position; the separated prefix remains at the end of the sentence.
Rarely a separable prefix may actually be two words:
A small number of verbs have a prefix that is separable in some uses and inseparable in others.
If one of the two meanings is figurative, the inseparable version stands for this figurative meaning:

Complex infinitives

Components and word order

Complex infinitives can be built, consisting of more than the original infinitive. They include objects, predicative nouns and adverbial information. These are packed before the original infinitive, if used isolated.
If one wants to express that they suddenly see a bird ;
Both sentences are correct but they have different focus.
Pronoun objects are usually mentioned before nominal phrase objects; dative nominal objects before accusative nominal objects; and accusative pronoun objects before dative pronouns. Order may change upon emphasis on the object, the first being more important. This can be viewed as a table:

Type	Order	Case
Pronoun	1	Accusative
Pronoun	2	Dative
Nominal	3	Dative
Nominal	4	Accusative

;normal
;unusual
;very strange
Native adverbs, like nicht, leider or gerne, are placed before the innermost verb.

Predicative nouns and predicative adjectives

A predicative adjective can be the positive, comparative or superlative stem of an adjective, therefore it has the same form as the adverb. One might also use positional phrases or pronominal adverbs.
A predicative noun is a nominal phrase in the nominative case.
Note that, if the subject is singular, the predicative noun must not be plural.
3rd person pronouns are handled like any nominal phrase when used in a predicative way.
1st person or 2nd person pronouns are never used as predicative pronouns.
Normally, one makes an inversion when using a definite pronoun as predicativum.

Adverbs

One can use any kind of adverbial phrase or native adverb mentioned above.
But beware of modal verbs, they change the meaning and phrase of the sentence.

Compound infinitives

s can be constructed by the usage of modal verbs or auxiliary verbs. One places a new infinitive behind the main infinitive. Then this outer infinitive will be conjugated instead of the old inner infinitive. Sometimes one must turn the old infinitive into a passive participle.

Passive infinitive

There are two types of passive forms: static passive and dynamic passive. They differ by their auxiliary words. The static passive uses sein, the dynamic passive is formed with werden. In both cases, the old infinitive is turned into its passive participle form.
A complex infinitive cannot be turned into passive form, with an accusative object, for obvious reasons. This restriction does not hold for dative objects.
The only exceptions are verbs with two accusative objects. In older forms of German, one of these accusative objects was a dative object. This dative object is removed, whereas the real accusative object stays.

Perfect infinitives

The perfect infinitive is constructed by turning the old infinitive into the passive participle form and attaching the auxiliary verbs haben or sein after the verb.

sehen – gesehen haben
einen Vogel sehen – einen Vogel gesehen haben
laufen – gelaufen sein
einen schnellen Schritt laufen – einen schnellen Schritt gelaufen sein/haben

Note that the perfect infinitive of an intransitive verb is created the same way as the static passive infinitive of a transitive verb.
One can also build perfect infinitives of passive infinitives, both static and dynamic. Since the passive is intransitive, having no accusative object, one must use the auxiliary sein:

sehen
gesehen worden sein
gesehen geworden sein

sein is used as an auxiliary verb, when the verb is:

intransitive,
indicates a movement from one place to another, or
describes the alteration of a state

haben is used, when

actually any other case, but could be described more specifically

The use of haben and sein may depend on a sentence's meaning. I have driven the car is transitive and takes haben, but I have driven to Germany is intransitive and takes sein because of the position change, even though the verb, fahren, is identical.

Future infinitives

The future infinitive is more theoretical, because this infinite is only used in finite form. One keeps the old infinitive and appends the verb werden, which in the present tense means 'to become'.
The future infinitive can also be built by a perfect infinitive, which is used in the future perfect.

Infinitives with modal verbs

Modal verbs are verbs that modify other verbs, and as such, are never found alone. Examples may include the following: "may", "must", "should", "want", or "can". Such verbs are utilized by placing the modal infinitive behind the old infinitive, without changing any other word. Some modal verbs in German are: können, dürfen, müssen, brauchen, wollen, mögen, lassen.
A common misunderstanding among English-speakers learning German is caused by a divergence in meaning between English must and German müssen.
The meaning of must not is conveyed in German with the verb dürfen; "I must not" is therefore translated as ich darf nicht.