Have | Danish Grammar

Have ("to have") is the second pillar of the Danish verb system. It is the main verb of possession ("I have a car") and, even more importantly, the default auxiliary of the perfect — the verb you put before a participle to say "I have done" something. Like være, it is irregular but mercifully simple: thanks to the no-agreement rule, there is one present form (har) and one past form (havde) for every subject.

Principal parts

Form	Danish	English
Infinitive	(at) have	to have
Present	har	have / has
Past	havde	had
Past participle	haft	had
Imperative	hav!	have!

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Note the spelling of the past havde: the d is silent. It is written but not pronounced — roughly "haw-e." Likewise the participle haft is pronounced with the f, not a v. These are two of the most common spelling traps in beginner Danish.

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No agreement, as always: har is the whole present — jeg har, du har, han har, vi har, de har — and havde is the whole past. English still splits have/has; Danish does not.

Present: har

The present har expresses possession and is identical for every subject.

Subject	Form	Example
jeg	har	jeg har tid
du	har	du har ret
han / hun	har	hun har en hund
vi	har	vi har travlt
de	har	de har børn

Jeg har to børn og en kat.

I have two children and a cat.

Har du tid til en kop kaffe?

Do you have time for a cup of coffee?

Past: havde

The past is havde — remember, the d is silent.

Vi havde ikke penge nok til billetterne.

We didn't have enough money for the tickets.

Da jeg var barn, havde vi et gammelt sommerhus.

When I was a child, we had an old summer house.

Present perfect: har haft

To form the perfect of have itself, use har plus the participle haft: har haft ("have had").

Jeg har haft den samme bil i ti år.

I've had the same car for ten years.

Har du nogensinde haft et kæledyr?

Have you ever had a pet?

Past perfect: havde haft

Hun havde haft ondt i hovedet hele ugen, før hun gik til lægen.

She had had a headache all week before she went to the doctor.

Have as the perfect auxiliary

This is have's most important grammatical job. To say "I have spoken / eaten / worked," Danish puts har before the past participle. Have is the default auxiliary — the one to reach for unless the verb specifically demands være.

Jeg har talt med chefen om det.

I've spoken to the boss about it.

De har boet i Aarhus i mange år.

They have lived in Aarhus for many years.

Vi har arbejdet på projektet hele weekenden.

We've worked on the project all weekend.

The auxiliary trap: motion and change verbs take være

Here is the error English speakers make most often. English uses "have" for every perfect (I have gone, I have arrived). Danish reserves a special group — verbs of motion to a destination and change of state — for være instead. With those verbs, jeg er gået ("I have gone"), not *jeg har gået in that sense.

Toget er kommet, og passagererne er steget ud.

The train has arrived, and the passengers have got off.

Hun er rejst til udlandet.

She has gone abroad.

The full decision is laid out in Choosing Have or Være in the Perfect. The rule of thumb: if the verb describes getting to a new place or into a new state, try være; otherwise use have.

Imperative: hav!

The imperative hav appears mostly in well-wishing.

Hav en god rejse!

Have a good trip!

Hav det godt!

Take care! / Have a good one!

Har du...? — the standard question opener

Because Danish forms yes/no questions by inversion (verb first, then subject — see Yes/No Questions and The V2 Rule), have gives you one of the most useful question frames in the language: Har du...? ("Do you have...? / Have you...?"). There is no "do"-support as in English; the verb simply leads.

Har du en oplader, jeg må låne?

Do you have a charger I can borrow?

Har I spist endnu?

Have you (all) eaten yet?

Notice that English needs a helper verb ("do you...?") for the possession question but uses bare inversion for the perfect ("have you...?"). Danish uses the same bare inversion for both — har du covers "do you have" and "have you."

Common collocations and fixed expressions

have ret — to be right
have travlt — to be busy
have lyst til — to feel like / fancy (doing something)
have brug for — to need
have det godt / skidt — to be well / unwell

Jeg har travlt lige nu, men jeg har lyst til at mødes i morgen.

I'm busy right now, but I'd like to meet up tomorrow.

A natural exchange

— Har du set mine nøgler? — Nej, men jeg har lige haft dem i hånden. — Du har altid mistet noget!

— Have you seen my keys? — No, but I just had them in my hand. — You're always losing something!

Common mistakes

❌ Jeg har gået hjem allerede.

Incorrect for 'I have gone home' — a change-of-location verb takes være, not have.

✅ Jeg er gået hjem allerede.

I've already gone home.

❌ Hun haver en hund.

Incorrect — there is no agreeing form; the present is simply har for everyone.

✅ Hun har en hund.

She has a dog.

❌ Vi havd ikke tid.

Incorrect spelling — the past is havde (silent d), not havd.

✅ Vi havde ikke tid.

We didn't have time.

❌ Gør du have en oplader?

Incorrect — Danish has no 'do'-support; question is formed by inverting the verb itself.

✅ Har du en oplader?

Do you have a charger?

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