What Are Regular Verbs: Definition, Rules, and Worksheets

What is a Regular Verb?

A regular verb is a type of verb that forms its simple past tense or past participle by just adding “-ed” or “-d” to the base form. For example:

• Talk + ed = Talked (I talked to my mother.)
• Walk + ed = Walked (Mary walked the aisle.)
• Love + d = Loved (Kids are loved by their parents.)
• Yell + ed = Yelled (She yelled at me yesterday.)
• Relax + ed = Relaxed (Stay relaxed in every situation.)

See, that’s the beauty of regular verbs in English grammar, following a consistent or predictable pattern. Using regular past tense verbs becomes handy once you start practising it daily and understand its meaning.

Characteristics of Regular Verbs

The regular verbs possess simple and basic characteristics that are as follows:

• Follow a fixed pattern without changing its original meaning, but tenses.
• The simple past tense and past participle of these verbs are formed by adding “-ed” or “-d”.
• They often do not change the root spelling, thus making them easier to learn.
• They are the most common form of verbs in day-to-day English and work wonders with other parts of the sentence.
• Regular verbs offer clear and predictable expressions in the English language.

Rules for Conjugating Regular Verbs

There are 5 most common rules to conjugate regular verbs in English grammar, which stands to be very learner-friendly and clear.

• Add “-ed” to verbs ending with letters excluding “e”. Example: “relax becomes relaxed”.
• Add only “-d” to verbs that end with the letter “e”. Example: “hope becomes hoped”.
• Add “-ied” to verbs that end with the consonant “y”. Example: “cry becomes cried”.
• Add “-ed” to verbs that end with vowels + “y”. Example: “play becomes played”.
• Double the final consonant for short, one-syllable verbs with a vowel + consonant ending. Example: “stop becomes stopped”.

Now that you have understood what regular verbs are, their characteristics, & rules, let us dive in and explore a list of regular verbs in their base, past, and past participle forms in the section below.

List of Regular Verbs

Examples of Regular Verbs in Sentences

Practicing with various example of regular verb is crucial for mastering the concept of verb in grammar. And for this, below are 10 common examples of regular verbs with sentences. Read on!

• Talk (talked) - Joy talked to his mother on the phone day before yesterday.
• Clean (cleaned) - My parents have cleaned your room this afternoon.
• Play (played) - The Roar team has played baseball after school.
• Watch (watched) - My friends and I have watched the sun go down.
• Cook (cooked) - Parth cooked a scrumptious Indian meal for last night’s dinner.
• Jump (jumped) - Cristina jumped into a taxi and rushed to her home.
• Dance (danced) - Remo has danced in many competitions since childhood.
• Listen (listened) - I have not listened to the new album yet.
• Work (worked) - We have worked very hard to become this rich.
• Help (helped) - Rashmi helped her siblings with their homework.

Practice Exercises for Regular Verbs (Worksheets)

Becoming proficient with regular verbs stands to be crucial for building a strong base in Grammar, mainly for learning the past tense. Besides, the best way to master it is practising continuous practice. And for this, below is the worksheet of regular verbs, offering an intense exercise for your brain. Let’s brush up!

Worksheet 1

Ques) Rewrite sentences by changing the regular verb (underlined) into past tense form.

1. I listen to music in the morning.

2. We walk to the park every morning.

3. She plans her day carefully.

4. They bake cookies every Sunday.

5. He talks to his friend after school.

6. The baby laughs when she sees a toy.

7. My friend and I play soccer in the park.

8. They clean the house on weekends.

9. He paints exquisite sketches.

10. I dance at parties with my friends.

Answers of worksheet 1

1. I listened to music in the morning.

2. We walked to the park every morning.

3. She planned her day carefully.

4. They baked cookies every Sunday.

5. He talked to his friend after school.

6. The baby laughed when she saw a toy.

7. My friend and I played soccer in the park.

8. They cleaned the house on weekends.

9. He painted exquisite sketches.

10. I danced at parties with my friends.

Worksheet 2

Choose the correct past tense form of the regular verbs.

1) She _____ to the park every morning.

a) walks

b) walk

c) walked

d) walking

2) The students _____ their homework on time.

a) completes

b) complete

c) completing

d) completed

3) He _____ his room before dinner.

a) clean

b) cleaned

c) cleaning

d) cleans

4) He _____ the meal carefully.

a) prepares

b) preparing

c) prepared

d) prepare

5) We _____ to the music all evening.

a) listen

b) listened

c) listening

d) listens

6) The dog _____ in the yard.

a) plays

b) playing

c) played

d) play

7) I _____ the floor yesterday.

a) mop

b) mopped

c) mopping

d) mops

8) They _____ the movie last night.

a) watch

b) watching

c) watched

d) watches

9) She _____ an email to her teacher.

a) types

b) typed

c) typing

d) type

10) The chef _____ a delicious cake.

a) bakes

b) baked

c) baking

d) bake

Answers of worksheet 2

1. walked

2. completed

3. cleaned

4. prepared

5. listened

6. played

7. mopped

8. watched

9. typed

10. baked

Conclusion

So, we are here, winding up the regular verbs, which strengthen the foundation of your grammatical knowledge, helping you speak and write confidently.

Also, to make the regular verb in sentences a natural part of your everyday conversation, try practising daily with distinct worksheets and examples. For this, you can rely on Gradding’s English language experts, who help you with not only learning verbs but also adjectives, nouns, and other components through online english coaching.

FAQs

1. What are the differences between regular verbs and irregular verbs?

Ans. Regular verbs form their simple past tense and past participle by adding “-d” or “-ed” to the base form. Irregular verbs, on the other hand, have unpredictable and different past tense and past participle forms without any pattern. Refer below for examples for better understanding:

Regular Verbs:

• Walk, Walked, Walked
• Enjoy, Enjoyed, Enjoyed

Irregular Verbs:

• Eat, Ate, Eaten
• Put, Put, Put

2. How do you conjugate a regular verb?

Ans. By adding “-ed” or “-d” in the base form of any verb, you can conjugate a regular verb. For example:

INFINITIVE- Accept

SIMPLE PAST- Accepted

PAST PARTICIPLE- Accepted

3. How to identify regular and irregular verbs?

Ans. To check whether the verb is regular or irregular, look at the simple past tense and past participle of that respective verb. If both forms include “ed” or “d”, consider it regular, but if it does not have a common pattern and includes exclusivity, it’s irregular. For example:

REGULAR VERBS:

INFINITIVE- Love

SIMPLE PAST- Loved

PAST PARTICIPLE- Loved

IRREGULAR VERBS: 

INFINITIVE- Mistake

SIMPLE PAST- Mistook

PAST PARTICIPLE- Mistaken

4. What do we add to the end of regular verbs in the present perfect?

Ans. We add “ed” or “d” to the base form, which we use along with “has” and “have” to the end of regular verbs in the present perfect. For example:

1. Talk: Talked (I have talked to your principal.)
2. Enjoy: Enjoyed (She has enjoyed working with the company.)

5. How are phrasal verbs different from regular verbs in terms of usage?

Ans. Unlike regular verbs, phrasal verbs are not bound to follow any conjugation rule and are used along with one or more particles that can be adverbs or prepositions. Thus, these verbs often have idiomatic meanings and aren’t always literal. For example:

• Ate up
• Called off
• Look up
• Turn off
• Use up