Impersonal Constructions | Czech Grammar

Some Czech sentences have no subject at all — and that is completely normal, not a fragment or an error. English hates a subjectless sentence so much that it props one up with a meaningless "it" or "there": it's raining, it's cold, there's no smoking here. Czech throws all of that away and says simply Prší, Je zima, Tady se nekouří. This page is the friendly overview of Czech impersonal constructions: how to talk about the weather, how to say you feel cold, and how to make general statements about what "one" does. (A deeper, more formal treatment lives on the impersonal and subjectless sentences page.)

There is no Czech "it" or "there"

This is the mental shift to make first. English it in "it's raining" and there in "there's a problem" are dummy subjects — placeholders that fill the subject slot because English grammar demands one. Czech grammar demands no such thing. The verb carries its person and number in its ending; if there is no real subject, the verb just sits in the neuter third-person singular and that is the whole sentence.

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Never translate the English dummy it or there into Czech. There is no word for it. It's raining = Prší (one word). Adding a to or ono to fill the slot is the single most common English-speaker mistake.

Weather and ambient states

Weather is the classic home of the impersonal. Many Czech weather verbs exist only in the third-person singular — there is no "I rain" — and they stand alone as complete sentences.

Czech	Meaning
Prší.	It's raining.
Sněží.	It's snowing.
Mrzne.	It's freezing.
Stmívá se.	It's getting dark.
Svítá.	Day is breaking.
Hřmí.	It's thundering.

Vezmi si deštník, venku prší.

Take an umbrella, it's raining outside.

Celou noc sněžilo.

It snowed all night.

Pojďme domů, už se stmívá.

Let's go home, it's getting dark already.

Ambient temperature states use the verb být plus a special adverb-like word ending in -o: Je zima ("it's cold"), Je teplo ("it's warm"), Je horko ("it's hot"), Je tma ("it's dark"), Je hezky ("the weather's nice"). These describe the world in general, with no subject.

Dneska je venku pěkná zima.

It's pretty cold outside today.

V létě tam bývá hrozné horko.

In summer it tends to be terribly hot there.

The dative experiencer: how you feel

Here Czech does something English cannot. To say how a person feels — cold, hot, sad, sick — Czech keeps the sentence impersonal and puts the person in the dative case. The literal logic is "to-me it-is cold": the state is presented as something happening to you, not something you are.

Czech	Literal	Meaning
Je mi zima.	to-me is cold	I'm cold.
Je mi teplo.	to-me is warm	I'm warm.
Je mi smutno.	to-me is sad	I feel sad / lonely.
Je mu špatně.	to-him is bad	He feels sick.
Je nám dobře.	to-us is good	We feel good.

The dative pronoun does the work that English does with a nominative subject and the verb "to be" plus an adjective. Crucially, the person is never the grammatical subject — there is no subject at all.

Zavři okno, je mi zima.

Close the window, I'm cold.

Není ti špatně? Jsi nějaká bledá.

Aren't you feeling sick? You look a bit pale.

Po tom telefonátu mi bylo smutno.

After that phone call I felt sad.

A close relative is the chce se mi construction for "I feel like / I feel an urge to": again the person is dative, the verb reflexive and impersonal.

Chce se mi spát.

I feel sleepy. (literally: it wants itself to me to sleep)

Nechce se mi nikam chodit.

I don't feel like going anywhere.

The full case logic is on the dative of the experiencer page.

Necessity and possibility

Czech expresses "it is necessary / possible to do X" with fixed impersonal predicates followed by an infinitive — again no subject. The most common are je třeba and je nutno / nutné ("it is necessary"), dá se ("one can, it's doable"), and jde to / nejde to ("it works / it doesn't work").

Je třeba počkat na výsledky.

It's necessary to wait for the results.

Bez vízika se tam nedá dostat.

You can't get in there without a visa.

Dá se to opravit?

Can it be fixed?

Nejde to. Zkusíme něco jiného.

It doesn't work. Let's try something else.

The reflexive impersonal: the generic "one"

To make a general statement about what people do — English "one does", "you do", "they say", or a passive — Czech uses the reflexive impersonal: the verb in the third-person singular plus the particle se. There is no agent named; the action is presented as just happening.

Czech	Meaning
Říká se, že…	They say that… / It is said that…
Jak se to píše?	How is that spelled / written?
Tady se nekouří.	No smoking here.
Tady se nesmí parkovat.	You can't park here.

Říká se, že zítra bude pršet.

They say it'll rain tomorrow.

Jak se to slovo správně píše?

How is that word spelled correctly?

V kostele se nemluví nahlas.

One doesn't speak loudly in church.

Tady se nesmí kouřit.

No smoking here.

This is the everyday way Czech avoids naming a doer. The mechanics, and how it differs from the true passive, are on the impersonal se page.

A note on "there is": existence

English "there is / there are" also has no Czech dummy. Czech uses být ("to be") or existovat with the thing simply placed in the sentence, often after the verb. There's a problem is Je tu problém ("is here a problem"). This sits alongside the impersonal family and is treated fully on the existential sentences page.

Je tady někde lékárna?

Is there a pharmacy around here?

Common Mistakes

❌ To prší.

Incorrect — Czech has no dummy subject; 'it' is not translated. Just say Prší.

✅ Prší.

It's raining.

❌ Já jsem zima.

Incorrect — this says 'I am (a) winter'. The experiencer goes in the dative, not the nominative.

✅ Je mi zima.

I'm cold.

❌ Ono je tady horko.

Incorrect — no dummy 'ono' is needed; the impersonal predicate stands alone.

✅ Je tady horko.

It's hot in here.

❌ Tady ne kouří se.

Wrong order and split — the reflexive 'se' is a clitic in second position and the negation attaches to the verb: nekouří se.

✅ Tady se nekouří.

No smoking here.

❌ Tam je problém.

Marked — 'tam' means physical 'over there', not existential 'there is'. For 'there's a problem' use 'tu/tady' or no adverb at all.

✅ Je tu problém.

There's a problem.

Key Takeaways

Czech has no dummy subject: never translate English it or there. It's raining = Prší.
Weather/ambient states use a bare third-person verb (Prší, Sněží) or být
- an -o word (Je zima, Je horko).
The dative experiencer puts the person in the dative for feelings: Je mi zima ("I'm cold"), Chce se mi spát ("I feel sleepy"). The person is never the subject.
Necessity/possibility: fixed impersonals je třeba, dá se, jde to
- infinitive.
The reflexive impersonal (verb + se) makes generic statements: Říká se…, Tady se nekouří. The clitic se sits in second position.

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