Verb Types – STEP 2.

What is a verb?

Verbs are words that describe actions, whether physical or mental. Verbs also describe a
“state of being,” like the verbs be, become, or exist.

 Salah ran across the field, kicked the ball, and scored a goal.
 “I am the State.” —King Louis XIV

Some verbs also act as “helper verbs” to change the tense of another verb. Likewise, these
helper verbs can change a positive statement to a negative one with words like “not.”

 She has been jogging for a month and already feels her stamina increasing.
 “I don’t feel so good.” —Spider-Man

Every sentence needs at least one verb. If there’s no verb, it’s an incomplete sentence or a
sentence fragment. Except for imperative sentences (commands), a sentence also needs a
subject, the thing doing the action.

Subjects are important for a verb because they change how it’s conjugated, which we
explain below. This is especially true for the most common verb: be.

Types of verbs

Dynamic (action) verbs

Most verbs describe a physical action or activity, something external that can be seen or
heard. These verbs are formally known as dynamic verbs, but can also be called action or
event verbs.

 walk, laugh, swim, play, eat, drink, sing, dance, talk, say

There are a lot of actions that take place in our minds and feelings, which are not external.
Verbs that describe mental or internal actions are still dynamic verbs, but they’re not always
so obvious. These include “process verbs,” which describe actions of transition.

 consider, guess, change, grow, live, endure, succeed, fail

Stative (state-of-being) verbs

The opposite of dynamic verbs of action is stative verbs of being. Stative verbs describe a
subject’s state or feeling, including things they like and don’t like.

Examples: want, need, prefer, love, hate, like, dislike, seem, understand, know, believe,
involve, realize
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Verbs that can be dynamic or stative

A lot of verbs have more than one meaning, so they can be used as dynamic or stative.
These include perception words: see, hear, taste, smell, feel.

When perception verbs are used as an involuntary action, such as passive or unintentional
actions, they are stative. This applies when these verbs are used in the general sense, a state
of being that’s always happening.

 I can’t see without my glasses.

 Cake still tastes great even if it’s not your birthday.

When those same verbs are used for a voluntary action—specific, deliberate, and/or
temporary events—they are dynamic. Among other things, it means they can be used in the
continuous tenses.

 I haven’t been seeing well since I lost my glasses.

 We were tasting cakes for the wedding all afternoon.

Likewise, some perception verbs have alternative meanings, especially if they’re part of
expressions or phrasal verbs. Often, this means they act as dynamic verbs.

 Romeo and Juliet had been seeing each other for just five days when they died.

Other verbs, like think, have, and, above all be, follow the same voluntary/involuntary rules
as perception verbs. Depending on how they’re used, they can be either dynamic or stative.

 I think toads are better than frogs.

(stative: expresses an opinion or feeling always there; involuntary)

 All morning I was thinking about how toads are better than frogs.

(dynamic: expresses the temporary action of thinking; voluntary)

 I have a ten-year-old dog.

(stative: expresses permanent ownership; involuntary)

 I am having a party for my dog’s eleventh birthday.

(dynamic: used as part of phrase; voluntary)

 He is nice to everyone.

(stative: expresses an ongoing state or personality trait; involuntary)

 He was just being nice to everyone to get a promotion.

(dynamic: expresses a temporary/intentional state; voluntary)

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Auxiliary (helping) verbs

Auxiliary verbs, or “helping verbs,” are used in English to change another verb’s tense, voice,
or mood. When auxiliary verbs are used, there’s always a main verb that represents the
main action. However, the auxiliary verb must still be conjugated correctly.

The main auxiliary verbs are be, have, and do. We explain how they’re used specifically for
conjugating below, but here are a few quick examples:

 I have eaten sushi many times before. (tense)

 That piece of sushi was eaten by me. (voice)
 Did you eat my sushi? (mood)

Modal auxiliary verbs

Some auxiliary verbs are added to another verb to show necessity, possibility, or capability.
Like other auxiliary verbs, modal auxiliary verbs are not the main verb, but they do change
its meaning slightly. Some common examples are can, may, could, should, would, must,
ought, and might.

 I could swim across the English Channel, but should I do it?

 She must be the strongest person on the team, and might be the strongest person in
the region.

Phrasal verbs

Phrasal verbs are phrases that act as individual verbs, often combining two or more words
and changing their meaning. The verb get, for example, becomes many different phrasal
verbs when combined with different prepositions.

 When the bus stops, passengers get out on the sidewalk.

 After losing his job, he’s getting by on savings.

The important thing to remember about phrasal verbs is that they act as a single verb, so
you can still use them with other verbs and prepositions. However, when you conjugate a
phrasal verb, you only conjugate the part of the phrase that’s actually a verb, like get.

Verb categories

Transitive, intransitive, and ditransitive

Transitive, intransitive, and ditransitive refer to how a verb acts with direct and indirect
objects. A direct object is the person or thing that the action happens to, while an indirect
object is the person or thing that receives the direct object.

 Lindor threw the ball to deGram.

 Verb Types – STEP 2.0

In this example, the subject is Lindor and the verb is threw. The direct object is the ball
because that is what was thrown—Lindor did the action to the ball. The indirect object is
deGram because he received the direct object, the ball.

Verbs that don’t use either a direct or indirect object are called intransitive. These verbs are
complete actions by themselves.

 go, walk, run, talk, sit, sleep, work

Verbs that use a direct object, but not an indirect object, are called transitive. They don’t
always need a direct object, but they have the option.

 clean, like, love, dislike, hate, want, learn, deserve, say

Verbs that use both direct and indirect objects are called ditransitive. They don’t always
need an indirect object, but they have the option.

 throw, make, buy, sell, read, give, lend, bring

Just as a verb can be either dynamic or stative depending on the meaning, a verb can
sometimes act transitive while at other times act intransitive. These are known as
ambitransitive. For example, if you ask someone if they’re hungry, they might respond:

 No, I already ate. (intransitive)

 No, I already ate a sandwich. (transitive)

Active vs. passive voice

In English, the standard format where the subject performs the action is known as the active
voice. However, you can switch around your words to make the direct or indirect objects
the subject of the sentence, known as the passive voice. As explained in our guide to the
passive voice, you can make a verb passive by adding a conjugated form of be in front of its
past participle.

 Stricklen threw the ball to Williams. (active)

 The ball was thrown to Williams by Stricklen. (passive)
 Williams was thrown the ball by Stricklen. (passive)

Linking (copular) verbs

A linking verb is any verb, dynamic or stative, that directly connects or “links” the sentence’s
subject to other words in the sentence. For example:

 Garfield is a cat.

Here, “Garfield” and “a cat” are the same thing, so “is” acts as a linking verb.

A linking verb—also known as a copula or copular verb in formal linguistics—connects the

subject not just to other nouns and adjectives, but also to prepositional phrases and other
 Verb Types – STEP 2.0

verbs in the infinitive form. Although the verb be is the most-used linking verb in English,
other linking verbs like seem and become are also common.

 Garfield is in the kitchen.

 Garfield became fat by eating lasagnas.
 Garfield seems to hate Mondays.

Likewise, perception verbs are often linking verbs as well, but only when they describe what
is being perceived.

 The mild sauce also tastes spicy.

 Birds look happy when the sun comes out.
 The student felt pride when they used perfect grammar.

Regular vs. irregular Verbs

Verbs have different forms to show different uses, such as an action that happened in the
past, or an action that happens continuously. Normally, these forms follow the same
patterns of conjugation, so that you can use the same rules on all verbs. Verbs that use the
normal forms are regular verbs.

Unfortunately, some verbs don’t want to play by the rules. They have their own unique
forms with no patterns, specifically for the simple past tense and past participle forms.
These are the notorious irregular verbs, and there are quite a few of them—including the
most common verb be.

To make matters worse, the only way to learn how to use irregular verbs is to study them
and all their forms. On the bright side, we explain the best ways to memorize irregular
verbs. But first, you’ll want to learn the standard verb forms of the majority regular verbs
below.