German Separable Verbs: anrufen, aufstehen and the Prefix That Jumps to the End

German has a group of verbs that break in two. The verb anrufen (to phone) is one word in the dictionary, but in a normal sentence it falls apart: Ich rufe meine Mutter an. This page covers the beginner version of that rule, in the present tense, and nothing harder.

The trick is that the break is perfectly regular. The stem goes where any German verb goes, in second place, and the prefix goes to the end of the clause. Once you can see that, the verbs stop looking like riddles.

The prefix goes to the end

Take a separable verb apart and you get a prefix and a stem. In a main clause, the stem is conjugated like any other verb and sits in second place. The prefix waits at the end.

Read the first column as the dictionary form and the third as what you will meet in real speech. The ending on the stem follows the person exactly as it would for an ordinary verb, as in German verb conjugation.

Two things catch beginners. First, the prefix stays at the end however long the sentence is: Ich rufe heute Abend meine Mutter an. Second, the prefix is part of the meaning. stehen is to stand, aufstehen is to get up, and the sentence only makes sense once you have heard the last word.

Some stems change their vowel, and they do it exactly as they would without a prefix. fangen gives er fängt, so anfangen gives Er fängt jetzt an. sehen gives er sieht, so ansehen gives Er sieht das Haus an. If you already know the plain verb, you already know the stem of the separable one.

There is no need to memorise a list of splits. Conjugate the stem, put it second, and send the prefix to the end. The same two steps work for every separable verb you will ever meet.

Which prefixes split off

A separable prefix is usually a small word you already know. The common ones are prepositions and adverbs, and each keeps a hint of its own meaning.

The prefix alone is not a reliable translation, because auf can mean up or open, and an turns up in verbs as different as anrufen (to phone) and anfangen (to begin). Learn each verb as a whole, with one example sentence, rather than trying to add the halves up.

How to spot one: the infinitive begins with a short, familiar word followed by a recognisable verb. aufstehen is auf plus stehen; einkaufen is ein plus kaufen. If you can see a verb you know hiding inside the word, with a small word in front of it, treat it as separable.

When you hear the verb, the stress lands on the prefix: AN-rufen, AUF-stehen, EIN-kaufen. A stressed opening syllable is the second clue, and it is why the prefix can stand on its own at the end of a sentence.

Questions and requests

The split follows the verb. Wherever the conjugated stem goes, the prefix still goes to the end.

In a yes or no question the stem comes first and the prefix still closes the sentence. With a question word, the stem is second, as always. In a command the stem is first and the prefix is last, and bitte slots in before it.

The du command drops the ending, so anrufen gives Ruf mich bitte an. The polite Sie command keeps the full infinitive form of the stem and puts Sie right after it: Rufen Sie mich bitte an.

After a modal verb: back in one piece

The split only happens to the conjugated verb. After a modal verb such as müssen, wollen or können, the separable verb is an infinitive, and an infinitive stays whole at the end of the clause.

The modal takes second place and carries the person ending. The separable verb moves to the end as a single word with its prefix restored. No splitting, no stray an at the end.

That is all a beginner needs. The same logic extends to the future with werden, to subordinate clauses with weil and dass, and to the perfect tense; separable verbs and word order is the going further page, once you are comfortable here.

Prefixes that never split

Not every prefix comes off. A small group of unstressed prefixes is permanently attached to the verb, and the verb behaves like an ordinary single-piece verb.

The test is stress. In a separable verb the prefix is stressed (AUF-stehen). In these verbs the stress falls on the stem (ver-STE-hen), and the prefix is an unstressed syllable with no clear meaning of its own. A verb like verstehen also looks like a verb you know with something in front, which is the trap: in meaning, stehen and verstehen have little in common, so do not hunt for a hidden word.

Mistakes English speakers make

The second row is the most natural slip. English can say I call up my mother, with the particle straight after the verb, and some learners put an straight after the stem in the same way. In German it goes after the whole of the rest of the clause, however long it is.

Another trap is looking a verb up. A dictionary lists aufstehen, not stehe auf, so when you meet Er steht um sieben auf, search for the verb under the prefix plus the infinitive of the stem. Reading to the end of the sentence before you look anything up saves a lot of confusion.

What to do next

1. Learn five whole verbs: anrufen, aufstehen, anfangen, ansehen, aufhören. Say each in a short sentence out loud.
2. Build a sentence with each one in the present tense, ending with the prefix.
3. Turn each sentence into a question, then into a bitte request.

When those feel automatic, read separable verbs and word order for the modal, future and subordinate-clause patterns in full.