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Perfect Tense

The perfect tense is used primarily in oral communication. It is one of several composite verb forms, i.e. a verb form that is made up of more than one element. The perfect tense requires an auxiliary verb (haben or sein) and a perfect participle. While the forms of sein and haben conform with the subject of the sentence, the participle always remains in the same form. Examples:

Weak verbs in the perfect tense:

Weak verbs usually take the prefix ge- and always add a -t to their stem. Examples: gesucht, gespielt, gemacht, gewohnt, gesagt, gefragt. Example sentence:

Markus hat drei Stunden garbeitet. Dann hat er eine Stunde gelernt und seine Hausaufgaben gemacht. (Markus worked for three hours. then he studied for an hour and did his homework.) [Note the use of the Simple Past tense here in the English.]

Strong verbs in the perfect tense:

Strong verbs usually consist of the prefix ge-, a changed verb stem, and the ending -en. Examples are:

Example sentence

Irregular verbs in the perfect tense:

Irregular verbs combine features of both strong and weak verbs in that they have the same endings as weak verbs but the same stem changes as strong verbs. These kinds of verbs are few in number. Some examples are kennen, gekannt (has been familiar with), bringen, gebracht (brought), nennen, genannt (named), wissen, gewusst (known). Example sentence:

Verbs with prefixes and verbs ending in -ieren in the perfect tense

If the verb is a separable-prefix verb, the -ge- is positioned between the prefix and the stem of the verb. Examples are:

Verbs with non-seperable prefixes do not add the prefix ge-. Examples are:

Verbs of foreign origin ending in -ieren likewise do not use the prefix ge-. Examples:

Example sentences:

The perfect tense and its auxiliary verbs

Being a composite verb form, the perfect tense requires an auxiliary verb in addition to the perfect participle. The auxiliary verb is either haben or sein. Most verbs use haben as their auxiliary verbs, but there are also a number of verbs that require sein. These verbs usually have to do with motion, for example:

– or with a change in condition, for example:

Frequently-used verbs that require sein are laufen, gelaufen (run), gehen, gegangen (walked), fahren, gefahren (gone, driven), reisen, gereist (traveled), sterben, gestorben (died), werden, geworden (become), bleiben, geblieben (stayed), sein, gewesen (been).

Summary: Verbs in the perfect tense

Auxiliary: haben

Examples: gefragt, (asked, weak verb) gesprochen (spoken, strong verb), gewusst (known, irregular verb), nachgedacht (thought about, separable-prefix-verb) verstanden (understood, non-separable-prefix-verb).

Auxiliary: sein

Examples: gereist (traveled, weak verb), gelaufen (walked, run, strong verb) , gerannt (run, raced, irregular verb), aufgewacht (woken up, separable-prefix verb)