Verbs and adjectives

Every Korean verb and adjective is listed in the dictionary with the ending -다. Take off -다 and what is left is the stem, which every other ending joins.

Adjectives are verbs too

A Korean adjective means "to be big", "to be good": it is a describing verb. It takes the same tense and politeness endings as a verb, and needs no word for "is".

• 날씨가 좋아요.
  nalssiga joayo.
  The weather is nice.
• 방이 작아요.
  bangi jagayo.
  The room is small.
• 어제는 추웠어요.
  eojeneun chuwosseoyo.
  It was cold yesterday.

Before a noun, an adjective takes a describing ending instead: 큰 집 keun jip "a big house" (Describing nouns).

A vowel or a consonant at the end

Many endings have two forms, one for a stem ending in a vowel and one with an extra syllable for a stem ending in a consonant, as particles do:

This guide writes such endings with the extra syllable in brackets, as Korean grammars do.

하다: making verbs from nouns

Many verbs are a noun with 하다 "to do", and many adjectives a noun with 하다 too:

The noun can also take the object particle, with 하다 as a verb of its own: 공부를 해요 "I study".

Verb or adjective?

Some endings go only on verbs: commands, -고 있다 "is doing" and the -는 describing ending, which also goes on the adjectives made with 있다 and 없다. A dictionary entry says which a word is: 크다 "to be big" is an adjective, 먹다 "to eat" a verb.