Irregular -IR Verbs
Learn about patterns for irregular -ir French verbs
Irregular verbs are the bane of every French student's existence, but there is some good news. There are some patterns in the irregularities - once you learn the conjugations for one verb in a group, you shouldn't have any trouble with the other verbs in that group.
There are four kinds of -IR verbs
- irregular -IR verbs like dormir
- irregular -IR verbs like ouvrir
- completely irregular verbs (pouvoir, venir, etc)
- regular -IR verbs
1. The first group of irregular verbs includes dormir, mentir, partir, sentir, servir, sortir, and all of their derivations (repartir, etc).
The endings for these verbs are as follows:
| Singular | Plural | |||
| je | -s | nous | -ons | |
| tu | -s | vous | -ez | |
| il | -t | ils | -ent | |
These verbs drop the last letter of the radical in the singular forms.
|
DORMIR |
||||
| Singular | Plural | |||
| je | dors | nous | dormons | |
| tu | dors | vous | dormez | |
| il | dort | ils | dorment | |
2. The second group of verbs includes couvrir, cueillir, découvrir, offrir, ouvrir, souffrir, and their derivations.
These verbs are conjugated like regular -ER verbs.
So the endings are
| Singular | Plural | |||
| je | -e | nous | -ons | |
| tu | -es | vous | -ez | |
| il | -e | ils | -ent | |
To conjugate ouvrir, remove the infinitive ending to find the radical ouvr- and then add the appropriate endings:
| OUVRIR | ||||
| Singular | Plural | |||
| j' | ouvre | nous | ouvrons | |
| tu | ouvres | vous | ouvrez | |
| il | ouvre | ils | ouvrent | |
3. Completely irregular -IR verbs: Unfortunately, some verbs do not follow a pattern - you have to memorize the conjugations for each one separately. Try this: learn one verb a day. Click on each verb for a table of its conjugations.
| asseoir | pleuvoir | valoir | ||
| courir | pouvoir | venir | ||
| devoir | recevoir | voir | ||
| falloir | savoir | vouloir | ||
| mourir | tenir |
| Test on irregular -IR verbs |
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