Irregular verbs in English
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Sign up for freeThis chapter is about the irregular verbs in English. The English irregular verbs all have their own form in the past tense and their past participle is formed differently.
Irregular verbs in English do not follow the same rules for the conjugation as the regular verbs. Each irregular verb has its own form in the past simple and past participle.
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The irregular verbs are conjugated the same as the regular verbs.
Only the 3rd person singular changes from the basic form of a regular verb in the present simple tense. The table below shows you these rules.
Rules for 3rd person singular | Example |
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Most regular verbs just add '-s' to the root of the verb for the 3rd person singular. |
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Verbs that end with a vowel other than 'e' get a '-es'. |
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Verbs that end with '-s', '-ch', '-sh', '-x', and '-z' get a '-es'. |
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Verbs that end in consonant and '-y' changes to 'ies'. |
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Verbs that end in vowel and '-y' gets '-s'. |
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Note that the examples contain regular and irregular verbs.
The verbs 'to have' and 'to be' both have a different conjugation in the present tense.
As mentioned above, the past simple and past participle of the irregular verbs differ per verb.
Take a look at the list of irregular verbs to learn the past simple and past perfect per verb.
Do the exercises below to practice the different tenses of English irregular verbs.
1 List of irregular verbs in English | Study the list of English irregular verbs with this overview. |