Regular and Irregular Verbs

Based on how we conjugate verbs in the past simple and the past participle, they can be divided into two types: Regular verbs and Irregular verbs.

What Are Regular and Irregular Verbs?

Based on how a verb is conjugated in the past simple tense and past participle, we can divide verbs into two categories:

Regular verbs
Irregular verbs

Regular verbs

Most verbs in the English language are regular verbs, which means that the past simple form and the past participle are created by simply adding '-ed' or '-d' or sometimes '-t', to the end of the verb.

	past simple form	past participle form
walk	walked	walked
call	called	called
wait	waited	waited
work	worked	worked
live	lived	lived
build	built	built

Irregular verbs

Irregular verbs do not follow a fixed pattern when turning into the simple past or past participle form.
Their number is limited compared to regular verbs. There are approximately 200 irregular verbs in the English language. The irregular verbs are categorized into four groups:

Group I: Verbs that have different base, past simple and past participle forms
Group II: Verbs that have the same past simple and past participle forms
Group III: Verbs that have the same base and past participle forms
Group IV: Verbs that have the same base, past simple and past participle forms

'work' is a regular verb

Group I of Irregular Verbs

All three forms of the group I irregular verbs have different forms. Look at the table below to see some examples:

	past form	past participle form
be	was/were	been
do	did	done
eat	ate	eaten
go	went	gone
see	saw	seen

Group II of Irregular Verbs

The past and past participles forms of the group II irregular verbs are the same. Look at the table below to see some examples:

	past form	past participle form
buy	bought	bought
leave	left	left
teach	taught	taught
find	found	found
have	had	had

Group III of Irregular Verbs

Group III of irregular verbs has the same base form and past participle form. Look at the table to see some examples:

	past form	past participle form
become	became	become
run	ran	run
come	came	come

Group IV of Irregular Verbs

All three forms of the group IV irregular verbs are the same. Look at the table to see some example:

	past form	past participle form
hit	hit	hit
cut	cut	cut
cost	cost	cost
hurt	hurt	hurt
let	let	let

Review

Based on how a verb is conjugated in the past simple tense and past participle, we can divide verbs into two categories.

Regular Verbs

The pronunciation at the end of the verbs can be /t/ /d/ or /ɪd/.

	Add d	Add ed	Add t it is common in British English
Present	dance	burn	burn
Past tense	danced	burned	burnt
Past participle	danced	burned	burnt

Irregular Verbs

There are four groups of irregular verbs.

description	present	past	past participle
Verbs that their base, past simple and past participle forms are different.	be	was/were	been
Verbs that their past simple and past participle forms are the same.	find	found	found
Verbs that their base and past participle forms are the same.	come	came	come
Verbs that their base, past simple and past participle are the same.	hurt	hurt	hurt

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What Are Regular and Irregular Verbs?
Regular verbs
- Regular Verbs
Irregular Verbs

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