Hente | Danish Grammar

Hente is the verb for going somewhere to get something and bringing it back — fetching the kids from school, picking a friend up at the station, grabbing a tool from the shed. The motion is built into the meaning: you go away from your starting point and return with the thing. In the digital age it has also become the standard Danish verb for downloading a file or an app. English speakers tend to flatten hente, bringe and tage med into "bring," so the heart of this page is keeping those three apart.

Principal parts

Infinitive	Present	Past	Past participle	Imperative
(at) hente	henter	hentede	hentet	hent!

Hente is a textbook regular -ede weak verb — hentede / hentet — with no irregularities. The imperative hent! is extremely common in everyday requests.

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The present henter serves every subject: jeg henter, du henter, de henter. Danish verbs are completely flat for person and number, so there is just one present and one past form to learn — no agreement endings anywhere.

Present tense

Note the built-in promise of return: hente always implies you'll come back with the thing or person.

Jeg henter børnene fra skole klokken tre.

I'll pick the kids up from school at three.

Henter du lige en stol fra køkkenet?

Could you just fetch a chair from the kitchen?

Jeg henter dig klokken otte, så vi kan køre sammen.

I'll pick you up at eight so we can drive together.

Past tense

Hun hentede posten, før hun gik på arbejde.

She collected the post before she left for work.

Vi hentede pizzaen selv for at spare leveringsgebyret.

We picked the pizza up ourselves to save the delivery fee.

Present perfect

The perfect takes har + hentet. Even though there is motion involved, the focus is on the retrieving action, so the auxiliary is har, not være.

Jeg har lige hentet din pakke på posthuset.

I've just picked up your parcel at the post office.

Har du hentet den nye app endnu?

Have you downloaded the new app yet?

The download sense

In modern Danish, hente is the ordinary word for downloading. The logic is the same as the physical sense: you fetch a file from somewhere and bring it onto your device.

Du kan hente programmet gratis på deres hjemmeside.

You can download the program for free from their website.

Filen er for stor til at hente over mobildata.

The file is too big to download over mobile data.

Key collocations

Expression	Meaning
hente nogen / noget	to go and get someone / something
hente og bringe	to pick up and drop off (e.g. kids, parcels)
afhente	to collect (more formal — parcels, orders)
hente hjælp	to go and get help / fetch help
hente en fil / en app	to download a file / an app

Kan du hente hjælp? Han er kommet til skade.

Can you go and get help? He's hurt himself.

Pakken kan afhentes i butikken efter klokken tolv.

The parcel can be collected in the shop after twelve. (afhentes = passive of the formal afhente)

Hente vs bringe vs tage med — the retrieval split

This is the distinction that trips up English speakers, because English "bring" and "fetch" don't map cleanly onto the Danish three-way system. The deciding factor is direction of motion relative to where you are.

hente — you go away to the thing and come back with it. Motion: there-and-back, retrieving.
bringe — you carry/deliver something to a place, often formal or written. Motion: toward a destination, one-way.
tage med — you take something along on a trip you're already making. Motion: it accompanies you.

Jeg henter vinen — den står nede i kælderen.

I'll go and get the wine — it's down in the cellar (there and back).

Kan du tage en flaske vin med til festen?

Can you bring a bottle of wine to the party (along with you)?

Buddet bringer maden til døren.

The courier delivers the food to the door (formal/written delivery).

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Decision rule: if you'll go and come back with it, use hente. If it comes along on a journey you're already taking, use tage med — see verb-reference/tage-med. Bringe is the formal "deliver/convey" verb and is far less common in casual speech than the English "bring" might lead you to expect.

A dialogue

– Jeg henter lige børnene, kan du tage maden med hjem? – Klart, jeg henter den hos thairestauranten på vejen.

– I'll just go and get the kids, can you bring the food home? – Sure, I'll pick it up from the Thai place on the way.

Common mistakes

❌ Kan du bringe en stol fra køkkenet?

Unnatural — going and getting a chair and returning is hente; bringe sounds like a formal delivery.

✅ Kan du hente en stol fra køkkenet?

Can you fetch a chair from the kitchen?

❌ Husk at hente din madpakke med i skole.

Wrong verb — taking your lunch along on the way is tage med, not hente.

✅ Husk at tage din madpakke med i skole.

Remember to bring your lunch (along) to school.

❌ Jeg hentede dig klokken otte.

This is fine for past, but learners often write hentet here — past is hentede, perfect is har hentet.

✅ Jeg hentede dig klokken otte i går.

I picked you up at eight yesterday.

❌ Jeg har henter pakken.

Incorrect — the perfect needs the participle hentet, not the present henter.

✅ Jeg har hentet pakken.

I've picked up the parcel.

❌ Du kan downloade appen gratis. (in careful Danish)

Understood but anglicism — the established Danish verb is hente.

✅ Du kan hente appen gratis.

You can download the app for free.

Key takeaways

Hente is a regular -ede verb: henter / hentede / hentet, imperative hent!
Core meaning: go and get something, then bring it back — the round trip is built in.
It is also the standard verb for downloading files and apps.
Keep it apart from bringe (formal deliver), tage med (take along), and the formal afhente (collect).

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