German Verb Conjugations
WISSEN (to know a fact) - Fully Conjugated
The German verb wissen conjugated in all its tenses
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Lesson 16 of German for Beginners.
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MORE > kennen - to know (a person)
In the following chart you will find the conjugation of the irregular German verb wissen (to know). Although it is not a modal verb, the conjugation of wissen follows the same pattern as the modal verbs. Like the modals, and unlike normal German verbs, wissen has the same form for ich (1st person sing.) and er, sie, es (3rd person sing.). (For an introduction to the modals and a self-scoring quiz, see our Verb Review 2 page.)
German, like many other languages, has two different verbs that can correspond to the single English verb "to know." Like Spanish, Italian and French, for example, German makes a distinction between knowing or being familiar with a person or thing (kennen) AND knowing a fact (wissen).
The verb wissen is a stem-changing verb. That is to say, the infinitive's stem vowel i changes to ei in all the singular present tense forms (weiß), and to u in the past participle (gewusst). In many ways, as we said above, it behaves like a modal verb. Except for ihr wisst (formerly wißt), spelling reform has not affected wissen, so you should note that its singular forms are still spelled with an ess-zett (ß, except in Swiss German), while the plural forms use a double-s (ss).
This verb chart uses the new German spelling (die neue Rechtschreibung).
| Irregular Verbs - wissen | ||
| PRÄSENS (Present) |
PRÄTERITUM (Preterite/Past) |
PERFEKT (Pres. Perfect) |
| WISSEN - to know (a fact) SINGULAR | ||
| ich weiß I know |
ich wusste I knew |
ich habe gewusst I knew, have known |
| du weißt you know |
du wusstest you knew |
du hast gewusst you knew, have known |
| er/sie weiß he/she knows |
er/sie wusste he/she knew |
er/sie hat gewusst he/she knew, has known |
| WISSEN - to know (a fact) PLURAL | ||
| wir/Sie/sie wissen we/you/they have to |
wir/Sie/sie wussten we/you/they knew |
wir/Sie/sie haben gewusst we/you/they knew, have known |
| ihr wisst you (pl.) know |
ihr wusstet you (pl.) knew |
ihr habt gewusst you (pl.) knew, have known |
| Sample Sentences/Idioms with wissen Er weiß Bescheid. He knows all about it. (He's been kept informed.) Weißt du, wann der Bus kommt? Do you know when the bus is coming? Ich habe nicht Bescheid gewusst. I didn't know a thing about it. More wissen examples in Lektion 16B NEXT > wissen - Part 2 - More wissen conjugations VERBS > Verb-Lexikon (All verbs) Modals | wissen | kennen | Strong Verbs | Verb Index
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