The 3 families of REGULAR VERBS in French
What are they?
the first category contains the verbs called “ER” verbs because their Infinitive form ends with ER.
For instance...JOUER / TO PLAY
REGARDER / TO WATCHThis is the biggest family by far as it contains thousands of
verbs.
The second category contains the verbs called “IR” verbs because their Infinitive form ends with IR.
For instance ...FINIR / TO FINISH
CHOISIR / TO CHOOSEThis is the second largest category as it contains a few
hundreds
The third category contains the verbs called “RE” verbs because their Infinitive form ends with RE.
For instance ...VENDRE / TO SELL
ENTENDRE / TO HEARThis is a very small category as it contains only a few
verbs
What is a regular verb then?
A regular verb is called that way because it always follows the same regular pattern when
you use the different tenses.
This is what is great about them. You only need to learn the patterns for each of the 3
categories and you can apply your knowledge to
thousands of verbs
So, does that mean that all the verbs ending in ER, IR or RE are always regular?
Unfortunately not. Some like ALLER / TO GO PARTIR / TO LEAVE/ TO DEPART BOIRE / TO DRINK and hundreds of others are IRREGULAR
To find out if a verb is regular or not, check in a
verb table or check out my lessons on irregular verbs
But for now, let’s just go to my next lesson on
STEM and VERB ENDING