What are Common English Verbs?

Verbs are ‘doing words’. They tell us about actions or what people, animals, or things do. These verbs are very common in daily English conversations.

Learning these basic verbs helps you build simple sentences. You can talk about yourself and your routine.

Meet Your New English Verbs!

Here are some important verbs you will use every day:

• Live: To have a home in a place. I live in Madrid.
• Work: To do a job. She works in an office.
• Study: To learn at school or university. We study English at Langcom.
• Speak: To talk in a language. They speak Spanish.
• Go: To move from one place to another. I go to the gym every day.
• Teach: To help someone learn. He teaches math to young children.
• Play: To do a sport or a game. We play tennis on Sundays.
• Meet: To see someone for the first time or by arrangement. I meet my friends for coffee.

How Do We Use These Verbs?

For ‘I’, ‘you’, ‘we’, and ‘they’, the verb form does not change. It stays in its base form.

• I live in a big house.
• You work in a factory.
• We study at school.
• They speak English very well.

For ‘he’, ‘she’, and ‘it’, we usually add an ‘-s’ to the verb. But for A1, focus on ‘I’, ‘you’, ‘we’, ‘they’ first!

• He lives in London.
• She works in a bank.

Verbs in Action: Daily Life Examples

See how these verbs describe everyday activities:

• I live with my family.
• We work from Monday to Friday.
• You study hard for your exams.
• They speak two languages.
• I go to the cinema every weekend.
• She teaches Spanish at the university.
• We play football in the park.
• I meet my friend Gabriela in the afternoon.

Examples

• I live in a small apartment.
• We work in the city center.
• You study English online.
• They speak French and German.
• I go running every morning.
• He teaches history at high school.
• We play video games together.
• She meets her colleagues for lunch.

Practice

Common mistakes for Spanish speakers

Many Spanish speakers make these common mistakes:

• Using ‘to be’ with action verbs: In Spanish, you might say ‘yo soy trabajo’ (I am work). In English, you must use the action verb directly.
  ✗ I am work in an office.
  ✓ I work in an office.
• Forgetting ‘to’ with ‘go’ to places (but not ‘home’):
  ✗ I go to home.
  ✓ I go home.
  ✓ I go to the park.
• Changing the verb form for ‘I’, ‘you’, ‘we’, ‘they’: These verbs stay in their base form for these subjects.
  ✗ We lives in London.
  ✓ We live in London.

Frequently asked questions

What is a verb?

A verb is a word that describes an action, an event, or a state of being. For example, live, work, and study are all verbs.

Why are these common verbs important for A1 learners?

These verbs are fundamental because they help you talk about basic daily activities, routines, and personal information. They are the building blocks for simple sentences in English.

Do these verbs change their form?

Yes, sometimes. For ‘I’, ‘you’, ‘we’, and ‘they’, the verbs like live, work, study stay in their base form. For ‘he’, ‘she’, and ‘it’, we usually add an ‘-s’ (e.g., he lives, she works).

Related lessons

• common verbs