The verb få ("to get, to receive") is a workhorse, and many of its idioms have no clean "get" equivalent in English — they are built around small words (at vide, lov, ret, fat, øje) that turn få into a fixed phrase. On top of that, få drives one of Danish's most important constructions: the causative, "to make someone do something." This page covers the everyday idioms first, then the causative. For the conjugation, see the få reference.
Finding out and being allowed: få at vide, få lov
Two of the most frequent få idioms encode "find out / be told" and "be allowed."
| Expression | Meaning |
|---|---|
| få at vide | find out, be told |
| få lov (til) | be allowed (to), get permission |
| få ret | be proved right, turn out to be right |
Få at vide literally stitches together "get" + "to know" — the information comes to you. English speakers tend to reach for finde ud af (which also exists, meaning "figure out actively"), but få at vide is specifically being informed by someone or something.
Hvornår fik du at vide, at de skulle skilles?
When did you find out they were getting divorced?
Må jeg få lov til at gå tidligt i dag?
May I be allowed to leave early today?
Jeg sagde jo, det ville regne — og jeg fik ret.
I told you it would rain — and I was proved right.
Notice that få lov can stand alone (det får du ikke lov til — "you're not allowed to") or take til at + infinitive. The construction with an infinitive is part of the wider infinitive system covered in infinitive constructions.
Getting hold of and catching sight of
A cluster of få idioms is about perception and grasping — physically getting hold of something, or visually catching sight of it.
| Expression | Meaning |
|---|---|
| få fat i / få fat på | get hold of, reach (a person or thing) |
| få øje på | catch sight of, spot |
| få styr på | get control of, sort out |
Jeg har prøvet at få fat i dig hele dagen.
I've been trying to get hold of you all day.
Pludselig fik jeg øje på hende i mængden.
Suddenly I caught sight of her in the crowd.
Vi må få styr på økonomien, før det går galt.
We need to get our finances under control before things go wrong.
Each of these locks onto a preposition — fat i (or på), øje på, styr på — and the noun has no article. Learn the whole phrase, preposition included.
Getting into a state: få det bedre, få travlt
Få also expresses entering a state — getting better, getting busy. With det it describes how you're doing; with a bare adjective or noun it describes becoming.
Bare rolig, du får det bedre om et par dage.
Don't worry, you'll feel better in a couple of days.
Nu får vi travlt — toget går om ti minutter!
Now we're going to be busy — the train leaves in ten minutes!
Note få travlt ("get busy"): travlt is an adverb here, and the phrase means becoming busy, not "have time." It is a false friend for English speakers who map "get busy" onto something with tid ("time").
The causative: få nogen til at
This is the most important få construction and the one English speakers most often miss. Få nogen til at + infinitive means "to make / get someone to do something" — to cause an action by another person.
Hvordan fik du ham til at skifte mening?
How did you get him to change his mind?
Den vittighed fik alle til at grine.
That joke made everyone laugh.
Jeg kan ikke få computeren til at starte.
I can't get the computer to start.
The frame is rigid: få + object + til at + infinitive. English "make someone laugh" has no preposition, so English speakers drop the til at and produce få alle grine, which is ungrammatical. The til at is obligatory.
Getting something done: få gjort noget
Closely related is få + past participle, meaning "to get something done" — to manage to complete a task, often with the sense of finally getting around to it.
Fik du sendt den e-mail, jeg bad om?
Did you get that email sent that I asked for?
Jeg skal have fået ryddet op i garagen inden weekenden.
I have to get the garage tidied up before the weekend.
Here få takes a past participle (gjort, sendt, ryddet), not an infinitive — contrast the causative above, which takes til at + infinitive. The two patterns look similar but mean different things: få ham til at rydde op = "get him to tidy up" (someone else acts); få ryddet op = "get the tidying done" (the result is achieved, agent unspecified).
Common mistakes
❌ Jeg fik at vide det fra min nabo i går.
Word-order slip — the object pronoun follows the whole få at vide frame.
✅ Jeg fik det at vide fra min nabo i går.
I found that out from my neighbour yesterday.
❌ Den vittighed fik alle grine.
Incorrect — the causative requires til at before the infinitive.
✅ Den vittighed fik alle til at grine.
That joke made everyone laugh.
❌ Må jeg få lov gå nu?
Incorrect — få lov takes til at before the infinitive.
✅ Må jeg få lov til at gå nu?
May I be allowed to go now?
❌ Jeg prøver at få fat på dig hele dagen — jeg prøver at få fat dig.
Incorrect — få fat needs its preposition i or på.
✅ Jeg har prøvet at få fat i dig hele dagen.
I've been trying to get hold of you all day.
❌ Fik du sende den e-mail?
Incorrect — 'get something done' takes the past participle, not the infinitive.
✅ Fik du sendt den e-mail?
Did you get that email sent?
Key takeaways
- Få at vide = "find out / be told"; finde ud af = "figure out actively." Don't conflate them.
- Få lov til at, få fat i/på, få øje på, få styr på all carry fixed prepositions — learn the whole phrase.
- Causative: få nogen *til at
- infinitive = "make/get someone to do." The *til at is obligatory.
- Result: få + past participle = "get something done." Participle, not infinitive.
- Få travlt = "get busy"; få det bedre = "feel better." The state senses are idiomatic, not literal "get."
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Start learning Danish→Related Topics
- FåA2 — Full reference for få ('to get / receive') — principal parts, all core tenses in natural sentences, the all-important causative få + past participle ('have something done'), and the 'be allowed / manage to' uses with lov and tid.
- Collocations with TageB2 — The fixed expressions built on tage ('take') — tage en beslutning, tage fejl, tage sig af, tage stilling til — and where Danish 'tage' parts ways with English 'take'.
- Infinitive ConstructionsB2 — Danish infinitive clauses beyond the bare marker — for at, uden at, ved at, i stedet for at, the accusative-with-infinitive after perception and causative verbs, and til at complements, with the rules of subject control.
- Collocations: An OverviewB2 — Why Danish pairs specific light verbs (tage, gøre, få, lave, holde) with specific nouns, and how to learn these fixed combinations instead of translating word-for-word.
- Collocations with GøreB2 — The fixed expressions built on gøre ('do/make') — gøre rent, gøre ondt, gøre indtryk, gøre opmærksom på — and the gøre-versus-lave split that English speakers struggle with.