Verb Definition, Examples, Types of Verbs and Words

Verb Definition

Verb Definition: It’s a very common question what verb is? A verb is a word or group of words that is used in a sentence to indicate that something happens or exists, for example, happen, be, do, etc. In simple terms, a word that describes an action or the occurrence of an event is called a verb. In English Grammar, a verb is a word that we use to refer to actions (what things do) and states of being (how things are).

For instance, consider a few simple sentences,

“I am reading this article.” In this sentence, ‘reading’ is a verb describing a usual action.

“Jacob walks in the morning”. In this sentence, ‘walks’ is a verb describing a usual action

“Stephen is going to school”. In this sentence, ‘going’ is a verb describing a condition of action.

Verb Examples

Verbs are an important part of the English language and is classified under Parts of Speech. Let’s consider some more verb examples in the following table.

Sentence Verb Used
He complained to the police. complained
School offers many opportunities to learn new skills. offers, learn
Whatever jogging regularly to reduce fat. jogging, reduce
His friend was trembling with anger when he lost all his books while travelling to Delhi. trembling, lost, travelling
The radio broadcast last night that it will rain on Monday. broadcast, rain

Verb Examples List

A detailed list of Verb Examples is discussed below. You can learn the verb forms from the table given below to increase your English vocabulary.

Verb Examples
Drink Read
Sing Sit
Ring Cut
Choose Buy
Write Mark
Gain Match
Grant Move
Cool Enjoy
Believe Explain
Bring Open
Admire Order
Fail Offer
Break Draw
Agree Push
Amaze Prefer
Amuse Plan
Appear Play
Arrive Throw
Ask RingRepair
Behave Become
Borrow Flee
Blame Stand
Belong Pull
Believe Save
Call Slow
Cool Sneeze
Carry Solve
Cause Start
Clear Stop
Climb Draw
Enjoy Plan
Explain Play
Hunt Become
Ignore Flee
FightImprove Save
Impress Slow
Invite Sneeze
Jog Solve
Jump Start
Join Stop
Knock Tumble
Last Enjoy
Label Explain
Learn Open
Live Order
Look Offer
Love Push
Prefer Provide

Verb Meaning in Hindi

क्रिया is the Hindi translation of a Verb. A Verb is a part of speech that is been taught in both English & Hindi subjects. The definition or meaning of Verb (क्रिया) is explained as- A verb is a word that is used to express some action, feeling or existence. It tells us something about the topic in one sentence. As; Sleeping, waking up, reading, walking, dancing, talking, understanding, asking etc.

Types of Verb

The are two types of verbs in English Grammar. The classification is as follows.

Sometimes the Auxiliary Verbs are also known as helping verbs. There is a further classification of Auxiliary Verbs and Main Verbs as follows.

Auxiliary Verbs 1-Primary
2-Modal
Main Verbs 1-Intransitive
2-Transitive

Auxiliary Verb

As told earlier, auxiliary verbs are more commonly known as helping verbs. So as the name suggests, the helping verbs or the auxiliary verbs are used to support the main verb to describe an action. Let’s understand through an example. Consider the following sentence,

“Amit is jogging regularly to reduce fat.”

Here ‘Jogging’ is the main verb that describes the action being done by Amit and “is” is the auxiliary verb. This makes the sentence more apparent by telling that the action is being done in the present time. Suppose the above sentence would have been written like this,

“Amit was jogging regularly to reduce fat.”

Here the main verb (jogging) is the same but the auxiliary verb is changed to “was”. By doing so, it becomes apparent that the action was being done in the past. Now we have a rough idea of how Auxiliary verbs (Helping Verbs) assist the main verb to describe the action more specifically. Let’s discuss the main verbs.

Main Verb

Whenever a sentence describes some action, there has to be a main verb in the sentence. The main verb expresses or describes the principal action being done by the subject. It tells about the basic purpose of the sentence. Let’s understand through some examples. Consider the following sentences,

“He was trembling in the cold weather.”

In this sentence, “trembling” is the main verb. It tells about the main idea and action of the sentence. It tells what action is being done by the subject.

Transitive and Intransitive Verbs: The main difference between transitive and intransitive verbs is that with transitive verbs there has to be an object while with intransitive verbs the object is not required. Let’s understand through an example,

“The principal discussed the indiscipline issue with the teachers.” (Correct)

“The principal discussed with the teachers.” (Incorrect)

In these two sentences, the main verb is “discussed”, which can’t be used without an object. The verb “discuss” requires an object with it. The second sentence seems confusing as it’s not clear what was discussed with the teachers.

Verb Forms

Most of the verbs have three forms. The three verb forms are given below.

1. Present Verb

2. Past Verb

3. Past Participle Verb

For a particular verb, these forms can be the same or different. See the below table

First Form Second Form Third Form
Eat Ate Eaten
Cut Cut Cut
blow blew Blown
drink drank Drunk
ring rang rung
walk walked walked
give gave given
treat treated treated
fall fell fallen
ride rode riding
do did done

Phrasal Verbs

When an adverb or a preposition is combined with a verb then the whole term gives a new meaning. These types of terms are called phrasal verbs. For example,

“Break down – get upset”

Here the verb ‘break’ is combined with the preposition ‘down’. Individually these two terms have different meanings but when these two words are combined together, the whole phrase gives a different meaning.

List of Important Phrasal Verbs

Phrasal Verb Meaning Sentence Use
Call Around Call different people They called around but nobody helped them.
Break into Enter forcibly The thief entered into the house.
Check out Investigate The officer checks out the crime scene.
Get back Return When are you getting back from the picnic?
Get up Get out of bed We should get up early in the morning.
Give up Stop trying The problem was too difficult so I gave up.
Keep on continuing Keep on working until you succeed.
Log in Sign in Please log in to your email account.
Look after Taking care of He looks after his parents.
Run out Get consumed all The ration ran out before the war.
Run away escape His brother ran away when he saw your dog.
Stick to something Continue doing something Stick to your goal if you want to succeed.
Take off Remove Take off your shoes before entering the hall.
Turn up Appear suddenly The lion turned up in our way.
Warm-up Prepare for work-out It is advisable to warm up before any exercise
Run into Meet accidentally I ran into her mother in the market.
Pick out Choose I picked out the white dog for my home.
Look Out Be watchful Look out for the enemy in the dark.
Look Over Examine Look over the car before buying it.

Verb Forms in English- Click to Reading


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