Definition

All English verbs are either regular or irregular, depending on how they are conjugated. The majority are regular verbs, which means that “-d” or “-ed” is added to their base form (the infinitive of the verb without to) to create both the past simple tense and past participle.

The past simple tense and past participles of irregular verbs, on the other hand, have many different forms that do not adhere to a distinct or predictable pattern. Much of the time, their past tense and past participle forms are completely different from one another. Unfortunately, this means that there is no way of determining how to conjugate irregular verbs—we just have to learn each one individually.

Conjugating regular and irregular verbs

In the following sections, we’ll look at various examples of regular and irregular verbs and how the past simple tense and past participle are formed for each one.

We’ll also look at a few examples of how each of these different forms functions in a sentence.

What is a regular verb?

Regular verbs are defined as having both their past simple tense and past participle forms constructed by adding the suffixes “-d” or “-ed” to the end of the word. For most regular verbs, this is the only change to the word’s spelling.

Here are some examples of common regular verbs:

In all of the previous examples, the only alteration to the verb has been the addition of “-d” or “-ed.” Notice, too, that the past tense and past participle forms are identical in each case—this is a defining feature of regular verbs.

Changing spelling

In some cases, though, we have to modify the verb slightly further in order to be able to add “-d” or “-ed.”

For instance, with verbs that end in a “short” vowel followed by a consonant, we double the final consonant in addition to adding “-ed”;* when a verb ends in a consonant + “y,” we replace the “y” with “i” and add “-ed”; and when a verb ends in “-ic,” we add the letter “k” in addition to “-ed.”

For example:

*An exception to this rule occurs for words that end in a soft vowel and the consonant “l” (as in travel, cancel, fuel, label, etc.). In this case, we merely add “-ed” to form the past simple and the past participle (as in traveled, canceled, fueled, labeled, etc.)—we do not double the consonant. Note, however, that this exception only occurs in American English; in other varieties of English, such as British or Australian English, the consonant is still doubled.

Example sentences

• “I walk around the park each evening.” (base form)
• “I walked around the park in the afternoon.” (past simple tense)
• “I have walked around the park a few times this morning.” (past participle)

• “I’m going to chop some vegetables for the salad.” (base form)
• “He chopped some vegetables for the salad before dinner.” (past simple tense)
• “He had already chopped some vegetables for the salad.” (past participle)

• “Don’t copy other students’ answers or you will get an F.” (base form)
• “I think he copied my answers.” (past simple tense)
• “The only answers he got right were the ones he had copied.” (past participle)

• “Your father’s fine—don’t panic!” (base form)
• “I panicked when I heard he was in the hospital.” (past simple tense)
• “I wish I hadn’t panicked like that.” (past participle)

What is an irregular verb?

Irregular verbs, by their very definition, do not have spelling rules that we can follow to create the past simple tense and past participles. This means that the only way of knowing how to spell these forms is to memorize them for each irregular verb individually. Below are just a few examples of some common irregular verbs.

As you can see, irregular verbs can have endings that are dramatically different from their base forms; often, their past simple tense and past participles forms are completely different, too. Again, the only way to learn these variations is to memorize them.

Examples

Let’s look at some sentences that use irregular verbs in their various forms:

• “I am excited that college is starting.” (base form)
• “I was sad to leave home, though.” (past simple tense)
• “I have been making a lot of new friends already.” (past participle)

• “I drive to work every morning.” (base form)
• “I drove for nearly an hour yesterday.” (past simple tense)
• “I had already driven halfway to the office when I realized I forgot my briefcase.” (past participle)

• “I would love to grow vegetables in my garden.” (base form)
• “I grew some juicy tomatoes last summer.” (past simple tense)
• “He has grown a lot of different vegetables already.” (past participle)

• “I think I would like to get a dog.” (base form)
• “She thought a dog would provide some good company.” (past simple tense)
• “She hadn’t thought about how much work they are.” (past participle)

Conjugating third-person singular and the present participle

Although there are stark differences between regular and irregular verbs when it comes to conjugating their past simple tense and past participles, both kinds of verbs do follow the same conventions when creating present participles and present tense in the third-person singular (the other two elements of verb conjugation).

For example:

Regular Verbs

Irregular Verbs

The exception to this is the verb be, which conjugates the present tense irregularly for first, second, and third person, as well as for singular and plural:

For this reason, be is known as a highly irregular verb. Note, however, that it still forms the present participle following the same conventions as all other verbs.