The three slots

A compound directional complement is built in a fixed order. Read it left to right and nothing about it is mysterious.

• Verb - the action: 走 (zǒu, walk), 拿 (ná, take), 跑 (pǎo, run), 站 (zhàn, stand).
• Path word - which way: 出 (chū, out), 进 (jìn, in), 上 (shàng, up), 下 (xià, down), 起 (qǐ, rise), 过 (guò, across/over), 回 (huí, back).
• 来 / 去 - the viewpoint: 来 (lái) means the motion comes toward the speaker; 去 (qù) means it goes away from the speaker.

So 走 + 过 + 来 gives 走过来 (zǒu guò lái) - walk over here (toward me), and 走 + 过 + 去 gives 走过去 (zǒu guò qù) - walk over there (away from me). Same verb, same path, opposite viewpoint. The path word and the deixis word are both complements; stacking the two on a single verb is what makes the complement compound, as opposed to the single 来/去 you get on its own (上来, just come up).

This sits inside the wider family of complements. The closest relative is the resultative complement, which bolts a result onto a verb the same way a path bolts a direction onto one.

The 来 / 去 rule: where is the speaker standing

This is the whole game and learners who skip it produce sentences that are grammatical but point the wrong way. 来 and 去 are deictic: they are decided by the position of the person speaking, not by any fixed compass direction.

• 来 = the action moves toward the speaker (come).
• 去 = the action moves away from the speaker (go).

Worked through with a single verb and a single path:

• 他跑出来了 (tā pǎo chū lái le) - he ran out (toward me). I am outside; he comes out to where I am.
• 他跑出去了 (tā pǎo chū qù le) - he ran out (away from me). I am inside; he runs out and leaves me behind.

Nothing about the running or the doorway changed. Only where I, the speaker, am standing changed, and that flips 来 to 去. The basic standalone 来/去 and the co-verb logic behind direction are covered in co-verbs; here the same toward/away contrast is just riding on the end of a bigger complement.

A few standard pairings to fix the pattern:

• 拿出来 (ná chū lái) - take it out (toward me) / 拿出去 (ná chū qù) - take it out (away from me)
• 走进来 (zǒu jìn lái) - walk in (toward me) / 走进去 (zǒu jìn qù) - walk in (away from me)
• 跑回来 (pǎo huí lái) - run back (toward me) / 跑回去 (pǎo huí qù) - run back (away from me)
• 站起来 (zhàn qǐ lái) - stand up

Note the last one. 起 only ever takes 来, never 去: things rise toward the standing speaker's eye level, so 站起来 is the only option and there is no 站起去. This is the one fixed exception worth memorising up front.

When you only need one half

You do not always need both a path word and a deixis word. Plenty of verbs take a single directional complement, and a compound is just the case where both slots are filled.

• 上来 (shàng lái) - come up (deixis only, 上 is itself the path here on a bare verb)
• 拿来 (ná lái) - bring (it) here (deixis only)
• 走出 (zǒu chū) - walk out (path only, more written/formal, often wants a destination after it)

The compound version stacks both because you want to specify the path and the viewpoint at once: 拿出来 says both out and toward me, which 拿来 (just toward me) and 拿出 (just out) each only half-say.

Where the object goes: the split that catches everyone

Here is the part learners get wrong. When the verb has an object, and the motion is literal, the object usually wants to sit between the path word and 来/去, not after the whole complement. The complement splits open and the object drops into the gap.

• 拿出一本书来 (ná chū yì běn shū lái) - take out a book (toward me)

Read the slots: 拿 (verb) + 出 (path) + 一本书 (object) + 来 (deixis). The 来 gets stranded at the very end, after the book. The measure-word phrase 一本书 follows the rules in classifiers.

This split is strongly preferred when the object is a location, and obligatory feeling there:

• 走进房间来 (zǒu jìn fáng jiān lái) - walk into the room (toward me)
• 跑回家去 (pǎo huí jiā qù) - run back home (away from me)

You cannot say 走进来房间 for the location case - the place name has to land inside, in front of 来/去. For a plain (non-place) object, you have a choice: it may sit in the gap (拿出一本书来) or after the whole thing (拿出来一本书), and the second is common in speech. But the place object has only the split position. If you find that fiddly, the ba-construction is the usual escape hatch - 把书拿出来 (bǎ shū ná chū lái), take the book out - because 把 lifts the object out in front of the verb and leaves the complement intact behind it.

了 and the directional complement

The perfective aspect marker 了 normally lands at the very end of the directional, after 来/去, when the motion is complete.

• 他站起来了 (tā zhàn qǐ lái le) - he stood up
• 我把书拿出来了 (wǒ bǎ shū ná chū lái le) - I took the book out

With a split object you will also hear 了 right after the verb in some registers, but the safe, default position is at the tail, after 来/去.

Common errors

Error 1: choosing 来/去 from the doorway instead of the speaker

The single most frequent mistake. Learners decide 来/去 from the geography (in versus out) and forget the only thing that matters is where the speaker stands.

• ✗ I am outside the house, my friend runs out to join me, and I say 他跑出去了. WRONG for that scene. He is coming toward me, so it must be 他跑出来了 (tā pǎo chū lái le) - he ran out (to where I am). 去 would mean he ran out away from me, which is the opposite of what happened.

Always ask: does the motion end up closer to me (来) or further from me (去)? Decide from your own position, never from the door.

Error 2: putting a place object after 来/去

The location wants the split slot, before 来/去, and learners habitually shove it to the end as English word order tempts them to.

• ✗ 走进来房间 - WRONG. The room is a location, so it sits inside the complement: 走进房间来 (zǒu jìn fáng jiān lái) - walk into the room (toward me).
• ✗ 跑回去家 - WRONG. 跑回家去 (pǎo huí jiā qù) - run back home.

Error 3: pairing 起 with 去

起 only takes 来. There is no 站起去.

• ✗ 他站起去了 - WRONG. Rising motion is always 来 in this construction: 他站起来了 (tā zhàn qǐ lái le) - he stood up.

Error 4: dropping the path word and expecting the same meaning

拿来 and 拿出来 are not the same. The bare deixis loses the out.

• 拿来 (ná lái) - bring it here (no information about coming out of anything)
• 拿出来 (ná chū lái) - take it out, here (out of a bag, a drawer, a room, toward me)

If the object is emerging from inside something, you need the 出, not just the 来.

Minimal pairs side by side

Hold the verb and path still, move only the viewpoint, then move only the path. The contrast does the teaching.

Same machinery every row: verb, then a path, then the viewpoint word that anchors the whole thing to where the speaker is.

What to drill

1. Decide 来/去 from your own feet. Toward the speaker = 来; away from the speaker = 去. The doorway, the room, the compass are all irrelevant. Only your position is.
2. Build in slots: verb + path + 来/去. 跑 + 出 + 来 = 跑出来. Say it as three pieces until it fuses.
3. Park the location inside the complement. 走进房间来, never 走进来房间. Place objects go in the gap before 来/去, full stop.
4. Reach for 把 when the object is heavy. 把书拿出来 keeps the complement whole and dodges the split-object decision entirely.
5. Memorise 站起来 as fixed. 起 takes only 来, so this one never varies.

For the single 来/去 and the wider direction-of-motion logic, see co-verbs. For the complement family this belongs to, see complements and its near-twin resultative complements. For moving the object out in front when the split feels awkward, see the ba-construction.