Polish verbs
A Polish verb tells you in its ending who is acting: “czytam” already means “I read”, “czytasz” “you read” — no pronoun needed. And almost every verb comes twice, imperfective and perfective. You really do need both.
Three classes, six persons
The infinitive does not tell you how a Polish verb conjugates: czytać, pisać and dawać all end in -ać and go three different ways. The first and second person singular give the class away, and once you know them you know the whole present tense — six different endings where English has one “-s”:
| Person | -am, -asz | -ę, -esz | -ę, -isz |
|---|---|---|---|
| Infinitive | czytać | pisać | robić |
| ja | czytam | piszę | robię |
| ty | czytasz | piszesz | robisz |
| on, ona, ono | czyta | pisze | robi |
| my | czytamy | piszemy | robimy |
| wy | czytacie | piszecie | robicie |
| oni, one | czytają | piszą | robią |
For each of the 578 verbs on this site the first person therefore stands beside the infinitive, together with the past tense, which has changes of its own (mógł – mogła), and the aspect partner. Almost every verb comes twice: robić for the action as a process, zrobić for the action as a finished whole. This is not English simple against continuous — “I did it” can be either, depending on whether you mean the doing or the result.
The English speaker’s trap
A perfective verb has no present. Its “present” form is already the future — and będę, the nearest thing to “will”, goes only before an imperfective verb. Thinking from English, where every future takes “will”, you build it with both.
The check: if the verb is perfective, its simple form is already the future — zrobię means “I will get it done”. Only the imperfective needs będę: Jutro będę robić zakupy. — “Tomorrow I’ll be doing the shopping.”
The second trap: after a negative, the genitive
“I have time” is mam czas, but “I don’t have time” is nie mam czasu. After a negated verb, the object that would otherwise be in the accusative goes into the genitive — with mieć just as with lubić or widzieć: Nie widzę samochodu. English changes nothing but adds “don’t”; say nie mam czas and you will be understood, and sound foreign at once.
Where to go next
How a verb builds its forms is above. When to use which tense and which aspect is the question of the tenses, and that has a page of its own. This one deliberately stops before it becomes a poor copy of it.
The 1 grammar topics around the verb
Each with an explanation, a form table, example sentences and exercises of its own.
Practise 620 verbs
The verbs from the core vocabulary, across all the topic lists.