What Are Verbs? (With Examples)

Verbs are words that describe a mental or physical actiona state of beingor an occurrence. By doing sothey often give us the most information among the parts of speech in a sentence. A sentence can exist without a nounbut it cannot without a verb.

Verb Definitions and Verb Examples

A verb’s base form is its infinitivewhich is the verb root with the word “to.” From therea basic understanding of verbs continues with action verbs and linking verbswhich may be regular or irregular.

An action verb expresses something that the subject can do. A linking verb describes the subject’s feelings or state of being by “linking” the subject to a subject complement.

Verbs are also guided by tensewhich conveys an action’s timing.

Examples Action Verb

Wanda walks a mile every morning. (present tense)

Jason jumped into the swimming pool. (past tense)

Zendaya will watch the movie after school. (future tense)

Examples Linking Verb

Wanda seems dedicated to walking a mile every morning. (present tense)

Jason felt cold in the swimming pool’s water. (past tense)

Zendaya will be excited about the movie after school. (future tense)

Note how each word that follows the linking verbs is descriptive.

A verb is regular if it follows a standard pattern of conjugationwhich often means there is no vowel change among the present tensepast tenseand past participle. The past-tense verb and past participle also end in -d-edor -ied.

A verb is irregular if it follows a nonstandard pattern of conjugationwhich often means it has vowel changes among the present tensepast tenseand past participle. The past-tense verb and past participle also typically end in something other than -d-edor -ied.

Examples Regular Verb

Jason jumps into the swimming pool. (present tense)

Jason jumped into the swimming pool. (past tense)

Jason has jumped into the swimming pool. (present perfect with participle)

Examples Irregular Verb

Olena writes good books. (present tense)

Olena wrote good books. (past tense)

Olena has written good books. (present perfect with participle)

How Do You Recognize Verbs in a Sentence?

As you’ve seen in the preceding examplesthe verb tells us the actionstate of beingor occurrence in a sentence. This makes the verb central to understanding what is happening in the sentence.

You also can often identify a verb as the first word after the sentence subject (a noun or a pronoun).

Examples

Jason [subject] jumps [verb] into the swimming pool. He [subject] loves [verb] to swim.

Olena [subject] wrote [verb] good books. She [subject] was [verb] a talented author.

Zendaya [subject] will watch [verb] the movie after school. She [subject] is [verb] excited about it.

Pop Quiz

Identify the verbs in the following sentences.

1. That violin looks brand-new. I will buy it later today.

2. Hunter runs as fast as he speaks.

3. Katerina went to the store for toothpaste. She also bought some vitamins.

4. The monument has stood in the town square for two hundred years.

5. We will walk to Main Street and visit the coffee shop.

Pop Quiz Answers

1. That violin looks brand-new. I will buy it later today.

2. Hunter runs as fast as he speaks.

3. Katerina went to the store for toothpaste. She also bought some vitamins.

4. The monument has stood in the town square for two hundred years.

5. We will walk to Main Street and visit the coffee shop.

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