Les groupes de verbes en français

In French, verbs are divided into 3 groups according to the ending of their infinitive.

The infinitive is the form of the verb in the dictionary, without any mark of a tense. In English, the equivalent to an infinitive is when "to" is used in front of the verb.

Example : to play, to go, to listen, to write

Knowing which group a verb belongs to will be essential to form tenses accurately.

The verbs être and avoir don't belong to a group.

 

    1. Le 1er groupe/ the 1st group

Verbs in this group end in -er (sauf aller) and follow the pattern of the verb parler.

Those verbs are regular which means that they will follow a regular pattern.

Some verbs in this group have some variations:

- Verbs ending in -ayer (p.ex. payer).Those verbs can follow 2 patterns : il paye and il paie

- Verbs ending in -ger (p.ex. manger) Those verbs keep the vowel e after the letter g in front of the vowels a and o : il mangeait, nous mangeons.

- Verbs ending in -cer (p.ex. commencer) The consonant c becomes ç in front of the vowels a and o : il commençait, nous commençons.

- Verbs ending in -eler follow the pattern of appeler and in this case doubles the consonant l (il appelle) or  peler which takes an accent (il pèle)

 

2. Le 2ème groupe / the 2nd group

Verbs in this group end in -ir and their present participle/ gerund from ends in –issant.

These verbs follow a regular conjugation and follow the pattern of the verb finir.

Examples : finir, choisir, impartir, bénir, s'agir, rassir.

Maudire belongs to the  2ème groupe despite its ending in« ire ».

 

3. Le 3ème groupe/ the 3rd group

This group includes all the verbs that can not be categorised in the first and second group. These verbs have irregular conjugationsand most end in -oir and -re.

Those verbs are also characterised by irregular stems ( sai-, sav-, sach-, saur- are the stems used for the verb savoir only!)

Verbs ending in -ir whose present participle end in -ant belong to this group.

The verb aller belongs to this group.

Examples : aller, faire, prendre, dire, croire, naître, vendre, voir, pouvoir, vouloir, devoir, courir, partir, mentir.

Image by Biljana Jovanovic from Pixabay



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