Komme ('to come, arrive') is one of the most useful verbs in Danish, and it hides two things English speakers regularly get wrong: it forms its perfect with være, not have, and it powers the idiom komme til at, which expresses both accidents ('I happened to...') and inevitability ('I'll end up...').
Principal parts
| Infinitive | Present | Past | Past participle | Imperative |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| (at) komme | kommer | kom | kommet | kom! |
Komme is a strong verb: the past kom comes from a vowel change in the stem, not from a -de or -te ending. The participle kommet keeps the strong -et ending. Memorise the set as a unit.
Present: kommer
Bussen kommer om fem minutter.
The bus comes in five minutes.
Kommer du til festen på lørdag?
Are you coming to the party on Saturday?
Hun kommer altid for sent.
She's always late (lit. always comes too late).
Note that kommer can describe a future arrival with no extra future marker — bussen kommer om fem minutter is "the bus is coming in five minutes". Danish uses the present for scheduled and near-certain future events, just as English does in "the bus comes at six".
Past: kom
Vi kom hjem ved midnat.
We got home at midnight.
Der kom ingen til mødet.
Nobody came to the meeting.
Present perfect: er kommet
This is the single most important point on the page. Komme takes være in the perfect — jeg er kommet, not jeg har kommet — because it is a verb of motion to a destination. The perfect focuses on the resulting state: you are now here, having arrived.
Toget er endelig kommet.
The train has finally arrived.
Er du allerede kommet hjem?
Have you already gotten home?
De er lige kommet tilbage fra ferie.
They've just come back from holiday.
English has only one perfect auxiliary, "have", so English speakers instinctively reach for har. Danish (like German, Dutch, and French) splits the job: motion-to-a-goal verbs and change-of-state verbs take være. See Have vs Være in the Perfect for the full rule and the test you can apply.
Key expressions with komme
komme til at — accidentally / will end up
This is a small idiom with a big payoff. Komme til at + infinitive has two senses, both flowing from the same idea ("something comes to happen to you, not by your plan"):
- In the past, it marks an accident: 'I happened to / I accidentally...'.
- In the present/future, it marks inevitability: 'I'll end up...'.
Jeg kom til at tabe den.
I happened to drop it / I dropped it by accident.
Undskyld, jeg kom til at ringe til dig ved en fejl.
Sorry, I accidentally called you by mistake.
Du kommer til at fortryde det.
You'll end up regretting it.
It has its own dedicated page — komme til at — because it is so frequent and so easy to forget.
komme i gang — to get started
Lad os komme i gang med arbejdet.
Let's get started on the work.
komme an på — to depend on
Det kommer an på vejret.
It depends on the weather.
Om vi tager af sted, det kommer an på, hvad du synes.
Whether we set off depends on what you think.
komme forbi — to drop by, come past
Kom forbi til en kop kaffe, når du har tid.
Drop by for a cup of coffee when you have time.
Why komme takes være — the deeper logic
It is worth understanding why motion verbs behave differently, because the same logic governs gå, rejse, blive, and dø. The have-perfect describes an action you performed (jeg har spist — I did the eating). The være-perfect describes a resulting state you are now in (jeg er kommet — I am now in the state of having arrived). When a verb's whole point is to land you in a new place or a new condition, Danish naturally treats the perfect as a state and reaches for være, the 'be' verb. English collapsed this distinction centuries ago — Shakespeare still wrote "I am come" — but Danish kept it. So komme is not an arbitrary exception; it is following the deeper rule that motion-to-a-goal produces a state. The same verb can even switch auxiliaries: if you focus on the activity of coming over time rather than the arrival, the grammar shifts, but for plain "has arrived", it is always er kommet.
A short dialogue
— Er Mette kommet endnu? — Nej, hun kommer først om en time. — Det kommer an på trafikken, tror jeg. — Ja, hun kom til at glemme sin nøgle, så hun måtte vende om.
— Has Mette arrived yet? — No, she won't come for another hour. — It depends on the traffic, I think. — Yeah, she accidentally forgot her key, so she had to turn back.
Common mistakes
The number-one error is the auxiliary. Komme is motion to a goal, so it takes være.
❌ Jeg har kommet for sent igen.
Wrong auxiliary — 'komme' takes 'være', not 'have'.
✅ Jeg er kommet for sent igen.
I've come too late again.
❌ Bussen har lige kommet.
Wrong auxiliary for an arrival.
✅ Bussen er lige kommet.
The bus has just arrived.
Don't drop til at from the accidental idiom — komme alone does not mean 'happen to'.
❌ Jeg kom tabe min kop.
Wrong — the idiom needs 'til at'.
✅ Jeg kom til at tabe min kop.
I happened to drop my cup.
Use på, not af, in komme an på.
❌ Det kommer an af vejret.
Wrong preposition.
✅ Det kommer an på vejret.
It depends on the weather.
Finally, when the focus is the act of coming over a stretch of time rather than the arrival, you may still meet har været constructions — but for the simple "has arrived", always use er kommet.
✅ Hun er kommet sig efter sygdommen.
She has recovered from the illness (reflexive 'komme sig' — still 'være').
Now practice Danish
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Start learning Danish→Related Topics
- Komme til atB1 — The construction komme til at + infinitive — its two distinct senses (accidental/involuntary action and the personal future), the forms, and how to keep the two apart from deliberate action and from the plain present-as-future.
- Choosing Have or Være in the PerfectB1 — Why most Danish verbs build the perfect with have, but verbs of motion and change of state use være — and how the same verb can take either.
- Have vs Være in the PerfectB2 — Danish builds the perfect with two auxiliaries — default har, but er for motion-to-a-goal and change-of-state when you mean the resulting new location or state.
- Wrong Perfect Auxiliary for MotionB1 — Why Danish uses er (not har) in the perfect for arrival, departure, and change of state — and why the same verb can take both.
- TageA2 — Full reference for the strong verb tage ('to take'), the silent -g, and its central role in talking about transport.