izgledati (to look / appear) | Croatian Grammar

Izgledati ("to look / to appear") is the verb for visible, outward appearance — how something or someone physically looks. It is high-frequency and structurally simple, but it hides one trap that catches almost every English speaker: where English says "you look good" with an adjective, Croatian says izgledaš dobro with an adverb. Get that one point and you have the verb. The rest is a short menu of three complement patterns: a bare adverb, kao + nominative ("looks like a…"), and a da-clause ("it looks like / it appears that…").

Aspect

Verb	Aspect	Present 1sg	Note
izgledati	imperfective	izgledam	describing an appearance — a state, hence imperfective

Izgledati is imperfective and effectively unpaired in everyday speech — there is no ordinary perfective "to look". This makes sense: looking a certain way is a state, and states are imperfective. (You may meet a derived perfective izgledati "to wait out / catch sight of" in literary texts, but that is a separate, marginal verb and not what learners use.) Because it is a pure state verb, you will use it in the present and past, almost never in a "completed-event" frame. See the logic of state verbs at aspect overview.

💡

One rule does most of the work: izgledati describes how something looks, and "how" in Croatian is an adverb. So it is izgleda dobro / loše / umorno / sjajno — never the adjective *dobar / *loš. If you can replace the English word with "well/badly", you are in adverb territory.

Present tense

A regular a-class verb (stem izgleda-); all six persons are in normal use, since people and things can all "look" some way.

Person	Form	Meaning
ja	izgledam	I look
ti	izgledaš	you look
on/ona/ono	izgleda	he/she/it looks
mi	izgledamo	we look
vi	izgledate	you (pl.) look
oni/one/ona	izgledaju	they look

Izgledaš umorno, jesi li dobro spavao?

You look tired, did you sleep well? — adverb 'umorno', not the adjective '*umoran'.

Ova torta izgleda fantastično!

This cake looks fantastic! — adverb 'fantastično'.

The l-participle

Regular a-class. Agrees in gender and number with the subject (the thing that looks).

Gender / number	Form
masculine singular	izgledao
feminine singular	izgledala
neuter singular	izgledalo
masculine plural	izgledali
feminine plural	izgledale
neuter plural	izgledala

Perfect tense (perfekt)

Clitic biti + l-participle — the normal past for describing how something looked.

Person	Masculine subject	Feminine subject
ja	izgledao sam	izgledala sam
ti	izgledao si	izgledala si
on / ona	izgledao je	izgledala je
mi	izgledali smo	izgledale smo
vi	izgledali ste	izgledale ste
oni / one	izgledali su	izgledale su

Na fotografiji je izgledala puno mlađe.

In the photo she looked much younger. — comparative adverb 'mlađe'.

Future I (futur prvi)

The infinitive drops -i before the clitic: izgledati → izgledat ću. Note the spelling — izgledat ću, never izgledati ću.

Person	Form
ja	izgledat ću
ti	izgledat ćeš
on/ona/ono	izgledat će
mi	izgledat ćemo
vi	izgledat ćete
oni/one/ona	izgledat će

Kad oličimo zidove, soba će izgledati puno svjetlije.

Once we paint the walls, the room will look much brighter. — future + comparative adverb 'svjetlije'.

Imperative

The imperative exists (izgledaj, izgledajmo, izgledajte) but is uncommon and marked — you rarely command someone to look a way. It surfaces in fixed encouragement like Izgledaj samouvjereno! ("Look confident!") before an interview or photo.

Uspravi se i izgledaj samouvjereno na razgovoru.

Stand up straight and look confident at the interview. — rare but natural imperative.

Conditional I (kondicional prvi)

The bih-clitics + l-participle — for hypotheticals about appearance ("it would look…").

S kraćom kosom izgledala bi sasvim drukčije.

With shorter hair she'd look completely different. — conditional + adverb 'drukčije'.

Other forms

Passive participle: none — izgledati is intransitive (it takes no direct object), so it cannot be passivised.
Verbal adverb (present): izgledajući exists but is rare; you will not need it.

Key uses and government

1. + ADVERB — "looks good / tired / great" (the headline rule)

To say how something looks, use an adverb. This is the high-frequency pattern and the number-one source of English-speaker error, because English uses an adjective ("you look good"). Croatian treats it like "you look well": izgledaš dobro. The same goes for loše (bad), sjajno (great), grozno (awful), mlado (young), staro (old).

Izgledaš dobro, jesi li smršavio?

You look good, have you lost weight? — adverb 'dobro', NOT '*dobar'.

Nakon odmora izgledaju puno odmornije.

After the holiday they look much more rested. — comparative adverb 'odmornije'.

There is one genuine exception worth flagging: when the complement is a noun phrase rather than a manner word, it does take an adjective agreeing with the subject, because then you are describing what kind of X it is — Izgleda kao zanimljiva ideja ("it looks like an interesting idea"). But for the bare "looks ADJ" pattern, the adverb is the rule. See verb government generally at verb government.

2. kao + nominative — "looks like a…"

To compare an appearance to something, use kao + a noun in the nominative: Izgleda kao liječnik ("he looks like a doctor"). Kao takes the same case as the subject it compares to (here nominative), not the instrumental.

U toj uniformi izgleda kao pravi pilot.

In that uniform he looks like a real pilot. — 'kao' + nominative 'pilot'.

Ovo mjesto izgleda kao iz bajke.

This place looks like something out of a fairy tale. — 'kao' + a prepositional phrase.

3. da-clause — "it looks like / appears that…"

With an impersonal subject, izgleda + a da-clause means "it looks like / it appears that…", typically about evidence in front of you (the sky, the situation).

Izgleda da će padati kiša.

It looks like it's going to rain. — impersonal 'izgleda' + da-clause; you can see the clouds.

Izgleda da smo zakasnili na vlak.

It looks like we missed the train. — appearance based on visible evidence.

4. Contrast with činiti se — appearance vs. impression

This is the pairing to internalise. Izgledati = visible appearance (what your eyes report) + adverb. Činiti se = subjective impression (a judgement in your head) + dative experiencer, often with a da-clause. "He looks tired" (you see it) = Izgleda umorno. "It seems to me he's tired" (your read of him) = Čini mi se da je umoran. They overlap but are not interchangeable: only činiti se takes a dative experiencer. Full treatment at činiti se.

Izgleda mirno, ali čini mi se da je jako nervozan.

He looks calm, but it seems to me he's very nervous. — 'izgleda' = the visible surface, 'čini mi se' = the read underneath.

Common Mistakes

❌ Izgledaš dobar danas.

Wrong word class — 'how you look' takes an adverb: 'izgledaš dobro'.

✅ Izgledaš dobro danas.

You look good today.

❌ Izgleda umoran.

The bare 'looks ADJ' pattern uses an adverb: 'izgleda umorno'. (An adjective only appears with a noun phrase, e.g. 'izgleda kao umoran čovjek'.)

✅ Izgleda umorno.

He looks tired.

❌ Izgleda kao liječnika.

Wrong case — 'kao' here takes the nominative, matching the subject: 'kao liječnik'.

✅ Izgleda kao liječnik.

He looks like a doctor.

❌ Izgleda mi da pada kiša.

That dative-experiencer frame belongs to 'činiti se'. With 'izgledati' just say 'Izgleda da…'.

✅ Izgleda da pada kiša.

It looks like it's raining.

❌ Izgledati ću umorno na slici.

Spelling — the infinitive drops '-i' before the future clitic: 'izgledat ću'.

✅ Izgledat ću umorno na slici.

I'll look tired in the photo.

Key Takeaways

Izgledati (impf, izgledam) = "to look / appear" — visible, outward appearance; no everyday perfective.
The headline rule: "looks GOOD/tired/great" takes an ADVERB — izgleda dobro / umorno / sjajno, never the adjective.
Other patterns: kao + nominative ("izgleda kao liječnik") and da-clause ("izgleda da pada kiša").
Future drops -i: izgledat ću (never izgledati ću).
Contrast činiti se (subjective impression + dative experiencer): izgleda umorno = looks tired; čini mi se da je umoran = seems to me he's tired.

Now practice Croatian

Reading grammar gets you part of the way. The exercises are where it sticks — free, no signup needed.

Start learning Croatian→