GermanFluent

A1 · Questions

Kommst du …?

Yes/no question: verb first

FormVerb (Position 1) + Subjekt + … ?

Meaning and usage

A yes/no question asks for ja or nein. The conjugated verb moves to the first position, and the subject comes right after it. There is no helper verb like English do. So Du kommst (you come) becomes Kommst du? (do you come?).

Use this pattern for questions that can be answered with yes or no. The verb is always the first word, even when the sentence starts with a time word or an adverb: Heute gehst du ins Kino? is not a question; the question is Gehst du heute ins Kino?. Learners often keep statement order and only add a question mark, which sounds like an echo question, not a real question.

Examples 5

Test yourself

  1. 1 Sprachbausteine

    du gern Musik?

    Show answer

    Correct answer: Hörst

    The conjugated verb hörst goes in first position, and the subject du follows it. The other options either repeat the subject or use the wrong verb form.

    • Hörst du would repeat the subject du that already stands after the gap, giving Hörst du du gern Musik?.
    • Hören is the infinitive and does not match the subject du; the correct form is hörst.
    • Du hörst has statement order and would give Du hörst du gern Musik?, which repeats du and is ungrammatical.

In this topic: Questions

  1. Kommst du …? Yes/no question: verb first
  2. Was, wer, wie, wann, warum …? W-questions: question word first, verb second
  3. wo, wohin, woher where: position, destination, origin
  4. welcher, welche, welches Which: welch- takes the endings of der, die, das
  5. wie viel, wie viele how much, how many
  6. …, oder? statement + oder? = isn't it? right?
  7. Was für ein …? what kind of

Example sentences from Tatoeba, used under CC BY 2.0 FR. See sources.