wees (to be) — Full Forms

If you only ever truly memorise one verb in Afrikaans, make it wees "to be." Almost every other Afrikaans verb is breathtakingly regular — it has a single present form identical to the infinitive, and it builds its past with the all-purpose auxiliary het. wees is the great exception. It has a distinct present form (is), a distinct one-word past (was), and it is the one verb where you genuinely cannot rely on the regular machinery. The good news: once you have drilled it, the irregularity in the language is essentially behind you.

The full forms

The table below shows every form you need. Notice what is not in it: there is no person agreement at all. One present form covers ek, jy, hy, sy, ons, julle, hulle — every subject. The same is true of the past. Afrikaans verbs do not conjugate for person or number, and wees is no exception to that rule; it is irregular only in its stems, not in any agreement.

Present: is, for everyone

In the present, wees surfaces as is, and it never changes. Where English forces you to pick between am, is, and are depending on the subject, Afrikaans gives you one form to learn.

Note that is is the present of wees — you do not say ek wees for "I am." The bare infinitive wees appears only in the imperative, after another verb (e.g. sal wees, moet wees), and in the rare perfect.

Preterite: was, the one real everyday past

Here is what makes wees unique among everyday Afrikaans verbs. Ordinary verbs have lost their simple past tense entirely — you cannot say a one-word past of werk "to work"; you must build het gewerk. But wees kept a living one-word past: was. It is the normal, default way to say "was / were," and like the present it is identical for every subject.

The perfect het gewees exists — but use was

Afrikaans does technically have a perfect of wees: het gewees ("have been"). You will hear it, and it is not wrong. But for an ordinary past statement, native speakers overwhelmingly prefer the simple was. This is the reverse of the situation with normal verbs, where the het-perfect is the only option.

So: reach for was by default. Save het gewees for when you are stacking it with markers like al "already" or nog nooit ... nie and want the experiential, "have ever been" flavour — and even then was is usually fine.

Future: sal wees

The future is fully regular: the auxiliary sal "will" plus the bare infinitive wees, which sits at the end of the clause.

You can also use gaan "going to" for a near or intended future: Dit gaan koud wees "It's going to be cold."

Imperative: wees

To give a command with "be," use the bare infinitive wees.

How this maps to English

English speakers carry over three habits that misfire here.

First, English makes to be agree with its subject in elaborate ways (I am, you are, he is, they are). Afrikaans flattens all of that to is. Resist the urge to "find the right form" — there is only one.

Second, and more importantly, English has a living simple past for be (was / were) and a perfect (have been), and the two carve up meaning. Afrikaans was does the work of both English was/were and, very often, have been. Ek was daar covers "I was there" and frequently "I have been there."

Third, because nearly every other Afrikaans verb refuses a one-word past, learners sometimes "correct" themselves into ek het gewees for an ordinary "I was." That over-applies the regular rule. was is the form a native speaker reaches for.

Common mistakes

Key takeaways

• is = present, every subject. was = past, every subject. No agreement, ever.
• was is the everyday past — Afrikaans's most common surviving one-word preterite.
• het gewees exists but is reserved for experiential "have (ever) been"; default to was.
• Future is regular: sal wees. Imperative is the bare wees.
• This is the verb to drill, because once you own it, the rest of the Afrikaans verb system is regular. For how wees behaves as a linking verb in sentences, see copular verbs; for the parallel irregularities of "to have," see hê (to have).