Deutsches Partizip — German Perfect Tense Practice

A free app to practise the German Perfekt tense. Choose haben or sein and type the Partizip II for over 400 German verbs across CEFR levels A1 to C2.

When to use haben or sein

Most verbs use haben. Verbs of movement use sein: gehen, fahren, laufen, reisen. Verbs of change of state use sein: werden, sterben, wachsen, einschlafen. Fixed exceptions: bleiben, passieren, gelingen, scheitern.

Common German verbs in the Perfekt

gehen — ist gegangen. kommen — ist gekommen. machen — hat gemacht. essen — hat gegessen. sehen — hat gesehen. haben — hat gehabt. sein — ist gewesen. werden — ist geworden. bleiben — ist geblieben. verstehen — hat verstanden.

The Perfekt, and choosing between haben and sein

Germans talk about the past in the Perfekt far more than in the Präteritum, so this is the tense to get right first. It needs two things: the correct Partizip II, and the correct auxiliary. The second is where most errors happen, because the rule is about meaning rather than form.

Deutsches Partizip holds 1,639 verbs from A1 to C2 and drills both parts together — you supply the participle and choose haben or sein. A second mode covers the passive, using only the transitive verbs, since an intransitive verb cannot form one.

The auxiliary rule

Most verbs take haben. Sein is used with verbs of movement from one place to another, verbs of change of state, and a short list of exceptions including sein and bleiben. The distinction is genuinely about meaning: ich bin geschwommen if you swam somewhere, ich habe geschwommen if you simply swam. Practising the two together rather than separately is the point — in real speech you never have to produce one without the other.

The Perfekt is the past tense Germans actually speak in. Where English distinguishes I went from I have gone, spoken German uses one form for both: ich bin gegangen. Getting the Perfekt right is what lets you talk about yesterday, and it needs two things — the right participle, and the right auxiliary verb.

The shape of the sentence

The auxiliary takes the normal verb position; the participle goes to the very end. Everything else sits in between.

Ich habe gestern einen Film gesehen.
I watched a film yesterday.

This bracket is a defining feature of German word order, and the participle waiting at the end is what gives spoken German its distinctive shape.

Building the Partizip II

Weak verbs — the regular ones — take ge- at the front and -t at the end. machen gives gemacht, kaufen gives gekauft, spielen gives gespielt.

Strong verbs take ge- and -en, and usually change their stem vowel. sehen gives gesehen, trinken gives getrunken, gehen gives gegangen. These have to be memorised, but the list of genuinely common ones is shorter than it looks.

type	infinitive	Partizip II	meaning
weak	machen	gemacht	made / done
weak	arbeiten	gearbeitet	worked
strong	trinken	getrunken	drunk
strong	sprechen	gesprochen	spoken
strong	schreiben	geschrieben	written
mixed	denken	gedacht	thought
mixed	bringen	gebracht	brought

When ge- is left out

Two groups of verbs never take ge-, and this trips up almost everyone at first.

Verbs ending in -ieren. studieren gives studiert, not gestudiert. The same for telefonieren, fotografieren, reparieren, organisieren.

Verbs with an inseparable prefix — be-, emp-, ent-, er-, ge-, miss-, ver-, zer-. besuchen gives besucht, verstehen gives verstanden, erzählen gives erzählt.

The reason is stress. German only adds ge- when the first syllable of the verb is stressed. In studieren and besuchen the stress falls later, so there is nowhere for ge- to attach.

Separable verbs put ge- in the middle

When a separable prefix is involved, ge- slots in between the prefix and the stem. aufstehen gives aufgestanden, einkaufen gives eingekauft, mitbringen gives mitgebracht.

haben or sein?

Most verbs take haben. Use sein only in three cases, and the first is by far the most common.

1. Movement from one place to another. gehen, kommen, fahren, fliegen, laufen, reisen — ich bin nach Berlin gefahren.

2. A change of state. aufstehen, einschlafen, aufwachen, wachsen, sterben — er ist eingeschlafen.

3. Three exceptions to memorise: sein, bleiben, werden. Ich bin zu Hause geblieben.

auxiliary	when	example
haben	everything else, and all verbs with a direct object	Ich habe das Buch gelesen.
sein	movement to a new place	Ich bin nach Hause gegangen.
sein	change of state	Sie ist aufgewacht.
sein	sein, bleiben, werden	Er ist Arzt geworden.

The same verb can take either

A few verbs switch auxiliary depending on whether they have a direct object. fahren with an object means to drive something and takes haben; without one it means to travel and takes sein.

Ich bin nach Köln gefahren. — I travelled to Cologne.
Ich habe das Auto gefahren. — I drove the car.

The same applies to fliegen, schwimmen and ziehen. If there is a direct object, it takes haben.

Perfekt or Präteritum?

In conversation, use the Perfekt for almost everything. The exceptions are sein, haben and the modal verbs, where the simple past is more natural: say ich war müde rather than ich bin müde gewesen, and ich hatte keine Zeit rather than ich habe keine Zeit gehabt.

In writing — particularly narrative and journalism — the Präteritum dominates. Both are correct; the difference is register, not meaning.

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