German verb conjugation: 7 reference verbs

These 7 verbs — sein, haben, werden, machen, gehen, sprechen, and arbeiten — cover the most important conjugation patterns: irregular auxiliaries (sein, haben, werden), a stem-changing verb (sprechen: er spricht), a regular -en verb (arbeiten: adds an extra e in du/er forms), and the most common motion verb (gehen). Together they give you a template for every major German verb type.

A stem change is when the vowel in the verb stem changes in the 2nd and 3rd person singular (du and er/sie/es forms) of the present tense. For sprechen: ich spreche, but du sprichst, er spricht — the "e" changes to "i". This change only happens in present tense and disappears in Präteritum and Perfekt. Stem-changing verbs are marked in the table.

The Perfekt uses sein (not haben) as the auxiliary for: (1) verbs of motion that imply a change of location — gehen (gegangen), fahren (gefahren), laufen (gelaufen); (2) verbs expressing a change of state — einschlafen, aufwachen, sterben; (3) the special verbs sein itself, bleiben, and passieren. All other verbs use haben.

For regular (-en) verbs, follow the machen or arbeiten pattern. For stem-changing verbs, look up which vowel change applies (a→ä, e→i, e→ie, o→ö) — once you know the pattern, it applies consistently. For irregular verbs, check the irregular verbs reference table. The 7 verbs here give you the structural templates; the other tables fill in the exceptions.