Asua ("to live, to reside, to dwell") answers the question Missä sinä asut? — "Where do you live?" It is a fully regular Type 1 verb with the ungradating stem asu-, so it conjugates exactly like its neighbour puhua. Everything interesting about asua is in the location case that follows it: a state of dwelling always takes a static place case, and Finnish has two of them.
Principal parts
| Infinitive | Present 1sg | Present 3sg | Past 1sg | Past participle |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| asua | asun | asuu | asuin | asunut |
Core conjugation
| Person | Present | Past | Conditional | Perfect |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| minä | asun | asuin | asuisin | olen asunut |
| sinä | asut | asuit | asuisit | olet asunut |
| hän | asuu | asui | asuisi | on asunut |
| me | asumme | asuimme | asuisimme | olemme asuneet |
| te | asutte | asuitte | asuisitte | olette asuneet |
| he | asuvat | asuivat | asuisivat | ovat asuneet |
Imperative: asu! (2sg), asukaa (2pl); negative älä asu. Passive: present asutaan, past asuttiin, perfect on asuttu. Negative: en asu (present), en asunut / emme asuneet (past).
Asun Helsingissä aivan keskustassa, kävelymatkan päässä työstä.
I live right in the centre of Helsinki, within walking distance of work.
Missä sinä oikeastaan asut nykyään?
Where do you actually live these days?
Kuinka kauan olette asuneet tässä talossa?
How long have you lived in this house?
Where you live: inessive by default
Living somewhere is a state, so asua takes a static "in/at" case — never the directional illative of movement. The default is the inessive -ssa/-ssä ("in"):
He asuivat ennen maalla, mutta muuttivat kaupunkiin lasten takia.
They used to live in the countryside but moved to the city because of the kids.
Asun yksin pienessä kaksiossa kolmannessa kerroksessa.
I live alone in a small one-bedroom on the third floor.
Suomessa asutaan usein kaukana toisistaan.
In Finland people often live far apart from one another.
The place-name exception: adessive -lla/-llä
A stubborn set of Finnish place-names takes the adessive -lla/-llä ("on") instead of the inessive — including Tampereella, Rovaniemellä, Venäjällä, and many others. There is no reliable rule: you learn each place-name's case individually, the way you learn a word's gender in other languages.
Asuimme kokonaisen vuoden Tampereella ennen paluuta etelään.
We lived a whole year in Tampere before returning south.
Haluaisin joskus asua meren rannalla, kaukana kaupungin melusta.
Someday I'd like to live by the sea, far from the noise of the city.
Who you live with, and at whose place
To say you live with someone, use jonkun kanssa (the postposition kanssa with the genitive). To live at someone's place, use jonkun luona — the postposition luona ("at [someone's]"), which is how Finnish expresses "at grandma's, at a friend's" for people rather than places.
Asun vielä vanhempieni luona, koska vuokrat ovat kalliita.
I still live at my parents' place because rents are expensive.
Hän asuu poikaystävänsä kanssa pienessä yksiössä.
She lives with her boyfriend in a small studio flat.
Watch the everyday existential pattern too: when you announce who lives somewhere, the place comes first and the verb stays 3sg asuu, with the person in the nominative after it.
Naapurissa asuu vanha pariskunta ja heidän kissansa.
An old couple and their cat live next door.
Common Mistakes
❌ Asun Helsinkiin.
Incorrect — dwelling is static: use the inessive Helsingissä, not the illative.
✅ Asun Helsingissä.
I live in Helsinki.
❌ Minä asun in Helsinki.
Incorrect — Finnish marks location with a case ending, never a preposition.
✅ Minä asun Helsingissä.
I live in Helsinki.
❌ Asun Tampereessa.
Incorrect — Tampere idiosyncratically takes the adessive: Tampereella.
✅ Asun Tampereella.
I live in Tampere.
❌ Me asuu kerrostalossa.
Incorrect — 'me' takes -mme: asumme; asuu is the 3sg only.
✅ Me asumme kerrostalossa.
We live in an apartment building.
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Start learning Finnish→Related Topics
- puhua ('to speak')A1 — Conjugation and rection of puhua ('to speak'), a clean Type 1 verb: partitive for languages, elative for topics, allative for the person addressed.
- Inessive -ssa/-ssä: 'in'A1 — The inessive -ssa/-ssä means 'inside' (talossa, Helsingissä): location within, time within, and set idioms — and the ending forces the weak grade.
- Place Names: Helsingissä but TampereellaB1 — Each Finnish place name lexically takes the interior series (Helsingissä, Suomessa) or the exterior one (Tampereella, Venäjällä) — learned per name.
- Verb Type 1: -Va Verbs (puhua, ostaa)A1 — The largest class: drop the final -a/-ä for the stem, add endings, double the vowel in the third person; consonant gradation weakens four of six forms.
- Adessive -lla/-llä: 'on, at, by'A1 — The adessive -lla/-llä puts a noun on a surface or at an open place — pöydällä, torilla, kadulla — and also quietly marks the possessor and the means.