How To Conjugate Verbs in Hindi

Welcome! Learning how to conjugate verbs in Hindi will spring your Hindi speaking capability forward, BIG time! Learning to conjugate verbs is a big swing in the right direction of your conversational Hindi journey.

Conjugating a verb might seem complicated but I am going to make it easy. In this guide I am going to break down conjugation step-by-step. So that means:

1. this post is long.
2. you gotta follow along with each step.

Contents

What is a verb?
What does conjugation mean?
What is a subject of a sentence?
A verb’s relationship with time
How verbs work in Hindi
How to conjugate in Hindi
Present tense conjugation
Understanding hoo and hai
Present continuous tense conjugation
Future tense conjugation
Resources

What is a Verb?

A verb is a type of word. What type? An action word. A verb is a word that communicates the action of a person, animal, or thing. Or in other words what a person, animal, or thing is doing.

Verb Example of a Person

Verb Example of Place/Thing

Verb Example Of An Animal

So again, a verb is an action word. It communicates what a person, animal or thing is doing.

In English, you can identify a verb because it has a “to” in front of it.

• To make
• To look
• To run

To make, to look, and to run are the actual verbs. When a verb has the “to” in front, this is called the verb in its infinitive form. The infinitive form is fancy grammar speak for when the verb represents an action as a concept or as an idea rather than an actual action.

In the examples above, we conjugated each verb to use in sentences that had actual actions. And when we do that we drop the “to” and change the form of the verb to be able to use it in a sentence…and that is what it means to conjugate a verb.

What Does Conjugate
a Verb Mean?

Conjugating a verb simply means to change the verb into different forms. A verb changes form to reflect: the time frame, quantity and the person, thing or animal performing the action.

In English, verbs don’t change much when we conjugate them. Let’s look at the verb “to make”. Remember, “to make” is the verb in it’s infinitive form. And now we are going to conjugate it.

• I make
• You make
• He makes
• She makes
• It makes
• We make
• They make

As you can see the verb “to make” when conjugated in present tense becomes either “make” or “makes”.

Let’s do “to look”.

• I look
• You look
• He looks
• She looks
• It looks
• We look
• They look

Similarly, the verb “to look” when conjugated in present tense becomes either “look” or “looks”.

And lastly let’s do “to run”

• I run
• You run
• He runs
• She runs
• It runs
• We run
• They run

Again, the verb “to run” when conjugated in present tense becomes either “run” or “runs”.

So in English, verbs do not change that much when they are conjugated…but they do change.

Wouldn’t it sound weird to say, “he run fast?” or “They runs fast”? Yes, totally weird. So even though verbs don’t change that much when conjugated in English, they still do change.

In Hindi and in many other languages verbs change a lot when they are conjugated. And that’s what we are going to look at right after we review the subject of a sentence.

Subject Of A Sentence

Now that we have reviewed what a verb is as well as what conjugation is, let’s talk about the subject of a sentence.

The main person, thing, place or animal of a sentence is called the subject of the sentence. The verb tells us what said main person, place, thing, animal of a sentence is doing/does/will do/did.

These are subject pronouns. These are often the subject of a sentence and the basis for conjugations.

We already used subject pronouns just now when we ran through the verb conjugations above: I make, you make, he makes etc.

The: I, you, he are the subject of each sentence. Notice below, how the verb changes (conjugates) based on the subject.

The conjugated verb is either “make” or “makes” based on the subject doing the action.

The subject of a sentence can also be a named person, place, thing or animal.

So again, why does does the subject of a sentence matter for verb conjugation? The subject of the sentence determines how to conjugate the verb.

Verbs and Time

Now that we understand basics of verbs and related grammar let’s talk about verbs and time. Verbs have a direct relationship with time. We can talk about an action that:

• is done sometimes
• is being done right now
• already happened
• will happen

We call these different time frames, verb tenses. There are several tenses but for this post we are going to focus on learning 3 tenses:

1. Present tense
2. Present continuous tense
3. Future tense

You may see some examples of past tense, but we are not going to learn that in this post. Past tense is a whole different animal that requires a deeper dive into Hindi grammar. Starting off by learning and mastering these 3 tenses will certainly propel your conversational Hindi forward and once you’ve mastered them, you can move onto past tense.

Going back to our example about Sameer and cake, the examples below show how the verb “to make” changes to reflect the different time frames aka various verb tenses.

It’s important to understand the time frame of the sentence(s) because that will determine the conjugations as you can see above.

And now that we’ve reviewed some grammar, understand what verb conjugation is, and understand that verbs have a relationship with time we are {finally} ready to talk about verbs in Hindi.

How Verbs Work in Hindi

As discussed earlier, in English a verb in its infinitive form has “to” in front of it. Well there’s a Hindi equivalent. In Hindi verbs, in their infinitive form, end with “na”. For example:

More examples of Hindi verbs in their infinitive form:

In English, the moment we actually use the verb in a sentence, we drop the “to”. For example:

The equivalent in Hindi is we chop off the “na” at the end of the verb and we are left with the root of the verb.

But we cannot leave the verb truncated. We have to give the verb a new ending. And this is where the topics we discussed earlier in this blog: subject pronouns and tenses come together to understand how to conjugate a verb in Hindi.

How To Conjugate Verbs in Hindi

Take a look at these Hindi verbs again, in their infinitive form. They each have a “na” at the end. The moment we use any in a sentence we have to follow two steps.

Step 1: chop off the “na”
Step 2: Give the verb, a new ending.

Step 2, is to give the verb a new ending. A new ending means a conjugation. But what conjugation? Well, it depends on the verb tense and the subject pronoun.

We conjugate a verb based on the subject pronoun and the tense simultaneously.

In Hindi each tense has its set of conjugations (new verb endings). Just like in English, the conjugations help us understand the time frame = whether its present present continuous, future or past. And the subject pronouns correlate to a conjugation to communicate who or whom the doer of the action is.

These are the subject pronouns in Hindi.

Note: I = “Mai” regardless of whether the speaker is male or female. So how do you tell the difference?

Note: There are 3 “vo’s”. How do you distinguish them?

If “mai” is “I” for male and female, then how do you tell the difference? For example, “I make cake”. How do you tell whether “I” is male or female? The conjugation will tell you. Keep reading and it’ll all come together.

Now let’s talk about the 3 vo’s. Grammatically “he” and “she” are not “vo”. They are “vah”. BUT when I taught “vah” in my classes, I got push back from a few parents who said that they have never heard nor used “vah”. They say “vo”. And to be honest, so do I.

There’s a difference between everyday conversational Hindi vs. what’s grammatically correct. So now I teach he/she = “vo”. But that leaves us with 3 vo’s. So how do we tell the difference? How do we know if a sentence is vo (he makes cake), vo (she makes cake) or vo (they make cake)? We can tell by their conjugations.

And now you are ready to understand the first tense.

How To Conjugate in
Present Tense in Hindi

Understandably, many people think present tense is an action taking place right now. But that is not correct. Present tense is an action done sometimes. In other words, it’s an action that occurs, but it’s not occurring right now.

That’s why present tense is often referred to as the habitual tense because present tense is comprised of events that occur in your life — like a habit.

Let’s look at some examples of present tense to understand it better.

Hopefully these examples gave you some clarity as to why present tense is referred to as the habitual tense. These are actions undertaken regularly, just not right now.

In Hindi, there are 3 conjugations for present tense: thaa, thee, and thay.

This means that when speaking in present tense, every verb will have one of these endings. Which one? Here’s the present tense conjugation chart that shows the relationship between the subject pronouns and the conjugations.

Present Tense Conjugation Example

Let’s work through an example. We want to conjugate the verb “to eat” in Hindi, in present tense. The verb is “khaana”. Remember this is the verb in its infinitive form which represents the concept or the idea of “eating”. Now we are going to use the verb in sentences to actually show the act of eating.

Remember the steps.

Step 1: chop off the “na“
When we chop of the “na” we are left with “khaa”.

Step 2: Give the verb, a new ending.
Now we are going to give the verb “khaa” a new ending – a conjugation. In present tense our new ending options (the conjugations) are: thaa, thee, thay. So the 3 new conjugated verbs are:

• khaathaa
• khaathee
• khaathay

Don’t forgot the “khaa” root. Without that you don’t have a verb!

Amongst these 3, which one to use is determined by the subject pronoun:

And here you can see which conjugation to add to the verb based on each subject pronoun.

Below are the sentences we are going to translate into Hindi. We are going to walk through each one to figure out how to say each in Hindi.

Our first example is the very simple sentence, “I eat.” and the speaker is female.

Step 1: chop off the “na”. We are left with “khaa”.
Step 2: add a new ending to the verb “khaa”.

The present tense conjugations are: thaa, thee, thay. Since this is an “I” female sentence we use “thee”. Therefore the verb becomes “khaathee”.
Therefore, “I eat” (female) = Mai khaathee.

Now let’s do “I eat.” when the speaker is male.

Step 1: chop off the “na”. We are left with “khaa”.
Step 2: add a new ending to the verb “khaa”.

The present tense conjugations are: thaa, thee, thay. Since this is an “I” male sentence we use “thaa”. Therefore the verb becomes “khaathaa”.
Therefore, “I eat” (male) = Mai khaathaa.

Next let’s do “You eat.” For this one it doesn’t matter whether the doer is male or female. In other words the conjugation for “you” sentences is gender neutral. This is also the conjugation for the respectful form when referring to males in the respectful form.

Step 1: chop off the “na”. We are left with “khaa”.
Step 2: add a new ending to the verb “khaa”.

The present tense conjugations are: thaa, thee, thay. Since this is an “You” sentence we use “thay”. Therefore the verb becomes “khaathay”.
Therefore, “You eat” = Aap khaathay.

Now let’s do “He eats.” Here the doer of the action is “he” therefore male.

Step 1: chop off the “na”. We are left with “khaa”.
Step 2: add a new ending to the verb “khaa”.

The present tense conjugations are: thaa, thee, thay. Since this is a “he” male sentence we use “thaa”. Therefore the verb becomes “khaathaa”.
Therefore, “He eats” = Vo khaathaa.

Next is “She eats.” and the doer of the action is female.

Step 1: chop off the “na”. We are left with “khaa”.
Step 2: add a new ending to the verb “khaa”.

The present tense conjugations are: thaa, thee, thay. Since this is a “She” sentence we use “thee”. Therefore the verb becomes “khaathee”.
Therefore, “She eats” = Vo khaathee.

Next let’s do “We eat.” For this one it doesn’t matter whether the doers are male or female. In other words the conjugation for “we” sentences is gender neutral.

Step 1: chop off the “na”. We are left with “khaa”.
Step 2: add a new ending to the verb “khaa”.

The present tense conjugations are: thaa, thee, thay. Since this is a “We” sentence we use “thay”. Therefore the verb becomes “khaathay”.
Therefore, “We eat” = Hum khaathay.

And lastly let’s do “They eat.” For this one as well, it doesn’t matter whether the doers are male or female or a mix. In other words the conjugation for “they” sentences is gender neutral.

Step 1: chop off the “na”. We are left with “khaa”.
Step 2: add a new ending to the verb “khaa”.

The present tense conjugations are: thaa, thee, thay. Since this is a “They” sentence we use “thay”. Therefore the verb becomes “khaathay”.
Therefore, “They eat” = Vo khaathay.

Congratulations!
You just conjugated a verb in present tense in Hindi!

I want to take a moment to point out the conjugation on the two “I” sentences as well as the three “vo” sentences. Remember we said that the way to distinguish them is by their conjugations? Well let’s take a look again.

See how the conjugation makes ALL the difference? We need those conjugations to communicate whether the speaker is male or female.

Similarly for the 3 vo’s. The conjugation tells us whether the doer is male, female or a group.

Ok, we’re not done with present tense yet. Actually there is one word missing in each of these: hoo or hai.

Hoo and Hai

Hoo = am
Hai = is/are

We use these words ALL THE TIME in Hindi. These are verbs but they are not action verbs, rather they are state-of-being verbs. State-of-being verbs describe who or what something is. They describe a condition of existence.

We need to add one of these to each of our conjugated sentences. If “hoo” means am and “hai” means is/are then you can probably guess which one to use for each sentence that we translated:

I eat (female) – hoo
I eat (male) – hoo
You eat – hai
He eats – hai
She eats – hai
We eat – hai
They eat – hai

An easy way to summarize this is: The only time you use hoo is in “Mai” (I) sentences. EVERYONE else gets hai.

Note: For “we” you might be wondering why it’s “hai” instead of “hoo”. Even though “I’ is included in “we” there are others in the group as well, so using “hoo” would not represent everyone whereas “hai” does.

So now let’s finish conjugating in present tense by adding the hoo’s and hai’s. Note: these come at the VERY END of the sentence.

PRO TIP

Here’s my advice. Before moving on to the other tenses, first, master everything above this point. Why? Because the other tenses will be a B-R-E-E-Z-E.

ALL of the concepts, steps and grammar described above apply to present continuous tense. Thus I am going to assume that you know them and I will not explain them again.

How To Conjugate Verbs in Present Continuous Tense in Hindi

Now that you are a present tense conjugation master, let’s talk about how to conjugate in present continuous tense. Present continuous means an action happening right now. Or it can mean an action that is actively ongoing.

As you can see the present continuous tense is denoted by the “ing” conjugation. That tells us that it’s an action that’s occurring right now or actively ongoing. And as you can see, there’s only 1 present continuous conjugation in English.

But that’s not the case in Hindi. Hindi has 3 present continuous conjugations:

Let’s use the verb “to eat” again — khaana.

Step 1: chop off the “na“
When we chop of the “na” we are left with “khaa”.

Step 2: Give the verb, a new ending.
Now we are going to give the verb “khaa” a new ending – a conjugation. In present continuous tense our new ending options (the conjugations) are: rahaa, rahee, rahay. So the 3 new conjugated verbs are:

• khaa rahaa
• khaa rahee
• khaa rahay

Don’t forgot the “khaa” root. Without that you don’t have a verb!

Here’s the present continuous conjugation chart.

Let’s work through an entire verb. These are the present continuous sentences that we are going to translate into Hindi.

How To Conjugate Verbs in
Future Tense In Hindi

Ok, now that we have learned how to conjugate in present tense as well as present continuous tense, let’s learn how to conjugate in future tense.

Future tense is to talk about actions or events that will happen. For example:

The verb is conjugated by adding “will” in front of “make” to indicate the point in time – the future – an action that has not occurred yet.

These are the future tense conjugations and below that is the conjugation chart showing how the subject pronouns relate to the conjugations.

So if we refer back to the verb khaana (to eat), these are the different forms of khaana in future tense:

• khaa-oonga (I will eat. male)
• khaa-oongee (I will eat. female)
• khaa-ayga (He will eat.)
• khaa-aygee (She will eat.)
• khaa-engay (Applies to you, we and they)

As you can see, in future tense there are 5 conjugations, compared to 3 in the other tenses that we have discussed.

Another aspect that’s different in future tense compared to present and present continuous is that there are no “hoo’s” and “hai’s” in the sentence. And this should make sense to you as:

hoo = am
hai = is/are

These state-of-being verbs indicate a present state-of-being, but future tense is just that — the future, therefore no “hoo’s” and “hai’s”.

These are the future tense sentences that we are going to translate into Hindi.

And that is how to conjugate a verb in future tense in Hindi tense.

Summary and Take Aways

In this article you learned a step-by-step approach to learn how to conjugate verbs in Hindi. We covered three tenses: present tense, present continuous tense and future tense.

Additionally this article included a grammar refresher: what a verb is, what the subject of a sentence is and subject pronouns.

Understanding how to conjugate verbs – in different tenses – will propel your Hindi speaking capability significantly.

Resources

Build Your Hindi Verb Vocabulary

How To Conjugate “To Eat” in Present Tense in Hindi

How To Conjugate “To Eat” in Present Continuous in Hindi

How To Conjugate “To Eat” In Future Tense in Hindi

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About Samta Aunty

Growing up in Orange County, California, I learned Hindi and Indian culture from my parents and the community. At one point, in addition to understanding Hindi, I developed an interest in speaking, and my parents encouraged me.

Friday night was date-night with my mom. We would eat parathas and watch Hindi movies together. I asked lots of questions and switched to speaking in Hindi at home.

That day, in high school, when my Chachi in Delhi said, “Tumhari Hindi bahut achi hain” is one of my favorite memories.

I started Virtual PreSkool to pay it forward. It’s fulfilling when a student comes to class and excitedly shares that they successfully connected with grandparents/relatives or when they were in India and knew how to ask for directions.

After completing undergrad at UC Irvine, I did my MBA at the USC Marshall School of Business. I’ve been an entrepreneur my entire career.

When I’m not teaching and creating lessons, I’m usually exercising, cooking vegan meals, or traveling. I love writing about travel on my blog PassportPages.

Dhanyavaad!