14 Most Important German Verbs In Context With Examples: Auxiliary, Modal & Main Verbs In German

German verbs have different purposes and conjugations. In this lesson, Spring German teacher Brunhild will introduce you to the 14 most important German verbs.

Without verbs, little can be said, so let’s dive right into this!

1. Hilfsverben (auxiliary verbs)

Hilfsverben literally means “helping verbs”, because they help forming the tenses. There are only three of them in German:

The auxiliaries can be found in the following German conversation:

KIM
Hast du ‘nen Stift für mich dabei?
(Do you have a pen for me?)

MARIE
Du bist schlimm! Wieso bist du nie vorbereitet?
(You’re bad! Why can you never prepared?)

KIM
Ich habe es vergessen, okay?
(I forgot, alright?)

MARIE
Ich werde noch wahnsinnig.
(I’m going to be insane.)

KIM
Sei nicht so!
(Don’t be like that!)

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2. Modalverben (modal verbs)

The point of modal verbs is to specify the exact nature of another verb, the intention behind it.

There are six modal verbs in the German language.

The modal verbs express whether something is possible, necessary, allowed, wanted or demanded.

Eating, for example.

It’s all about eating but the intention is a different one everytime.

As you can imagine, just like with helping verbs, the modal verbs usually travel with another verb that they can specify. But it is also possible for both helping verbs and modal verbs to stand alone in a sentence. In the following dialogue, you will see modal verbs standing alone.

Musst du weg (must you go) literally means: Must you away

The modal verb stands alone because there is no other verb needed for the sentence to make sense and be correct in German. The same goes for Ich mag nicht mehr (I don’t want to anymore) – I don’t want to anymore. Mag is mögen (to want) in the first person. What she doesn’t want anymore doesn’t need to be explained by another verb, it becomes clear in the context.

Das kannst du (You got this) means: You got this. Literally it means “You can this”.  Das kannst du (You got this, lit.: You can this) a perfectly correct sentence in German.

3. Vollverben (main verbs)

Last but not least, we have the main verbs! These are all the other verbs I haven’t mentioned. Here are some examples:

Since there are thousands of main verbs, we think we can settle for these five for now.

Who would have thought that five main verbs would carry us through an entire dialogue! Together with the personal pronouns, of course.

As for now, it is time to summarize.

Summary for the most important German verbs

There are three kinds of verbs – Auxiliaries, modalverbs and main verbs. The auxiliaries we learned are:

They help are forming the tenses and usually stand with a modalverb or main verb.

There are six modalverbs:

Their job is to specify the intention behind a mainverb or an auxiliary.

And then we have learned five main verbs: