pokušavati / pokušati (to try/attempt)

Pokušati ("to try, to attempt") is the verb of the effort itself — separate from whether it works out. Croatian keeps a clean line between pokušati ("try to do X") and uspjeti ("manage to do X, succeed"): you can pokušati all day and never uspjeti. The pair is morphologically tidy — perfective pokušati, imperfective pokušavati, both regular a-class verbs — so the real lessons here are its government (a bare infinitive or a da-clause) and the aspect contrast: the imperfective for an ongoing or repeated attempt, the perfective for a single, bounded one. We'll also draw the line to truditi se ("make an effort, try hard"), which English speakers reach for when pokušati is the better word.

Aspect

The members split along "one go" versus "keeping at it". Pokušaj otvoriti prozor ("Try to open the window" — give it a single go) is perfective; Već sat vremena pokušavam otvoriti prozor ("I've been trying to open the window for an hour") is imperfective, because the attempt is stretched out and repeated. This is a suffixal aspect pair — the imperfective is derived from the perfective with the -ava- suffix; see forming aspect pairs by suffixation.

Present tense

Both are plain a-class verbs (stem + -m, -š, ∅→-a, -mo, -te, -ju).

The perfective pokušam is not a "now" form — it surfaces in subordinate clauses ("if/when I try") and after other modals (moram pokušati). The thing you say while trying is the imperfective pokušavam.

The l-participle

Regular a-class: masculine pokušao (vocalised -l), pokušavao.

Perfect tense (perfekt)

Clitic biti + l-participle. The everyday "I tried" is the perfective pokušao sam / pokušala sam; the imperfective pokušavao sam marks the effort as drawn-out or repeated ("I kept trying / I was trying").

Future I (futur prvi)

Pokušati → pokušat ću (drops -i); pokušavati → pokušavat ću. Never pokušati ću.

Imperative

The perfective pokušaj! ("(go on,) try!") is the everyday encouragement for a single go; the imperfective pokušavaj! pushes "keep trying / keep at it".

The negative request is Nemoj ni pokušavati ("Don't even try"), where the imperfective is the natural choice after nemoj.

Conditional I (kondicional prvi)

bih-clitics + l-participle — for tentative offers and hypotheticals.

Other forms

• Passive participle: pokušan, pokušana, pokušano ("attempted") exists but is uncommon in everyday speech; you meet it mostly in the formal/legal pokušaj noun phrases such as pokušaj ubojstva ("attempted murder") — note the noun pokušaj ("an attempt") is by far the more frequent way to nominalise the idea.
• Verbal adverb: the imperfective pokušavajući ("[while] trying / in an attempt to") is genuinely common in writing: Pao je pokušavajući preskočiti ogradu ("He fell trying to jump the fence").

Key uses and government

1. The core frame: pokušati + infinitive

The everyday construction is pokušati + a bare infinitive — "try to do". This is the western-standard default; the da-clause (Pokušao sam da dođem) is heard in speech and the eastern norm but feels colloquial in Croatian. See da + present vs the infinitive.

2. Reflexive pokušati se — only with reflexive complements

Pokušati itself is not inherently reflexive; the se you sometimes see belongs to the complement verb (pokušati se nasmijati = "try to laugh", where se goes with nasmijati se). Don't add a stray se to pokušati on its own.

3. pokušati vs truditi se — "try" vs "make an effort"

Where pokušati names a discrete attempt at a specific action, truditi se ("to make an effort, try hard") describes sustained effort or good intentions. Truditi se is itself reflexive (always with se), is imperfective, and typically takes da + present (or oko + genitive for "work on" something). Use trudim se for "I'm doing my best", pokušavam for "I'm attempting (this specific thing)".

4. pokušati vs uspjeti — effort vs result

Keep them apart: pokušati is the attempt, uspjeti is the success. English "I tried to fix it" stays pokušao sam popraviti; "I managed to fix it" is uspio sam popraviti (see uspjeti).

Common Mistakes

Key Takeaways

• pokušati (pf, pokušam, pokušao) = one bounded attempt; pokušavati (impf, pokušavam, pokušavao) = trying repeatedly / an attempt in progress.
• Government: bare infinitive ("try to do"); the da-clause is colloquial in Croatian. A direct object (pokušati sve) is also possible.
• Imperfective for spans (cijeli dan pokušavam), perfective for one go (pokušaj!).
• Distinguish truditi se (sustained effort, "do one's best", + da) and uspjeti (the result, "manage/succeed") — pokušati is neither.
• Future drops -i: pokušat ću (never pokušati ću). The frequent nominal is pokušaj ("an attempt"); the verbal adverb pokušavajući is common in writing.