hlakka ("to look forward to") is the verb of anticipation — the warm feeling of waiting for something good. It is a perfectly regular weak Class-1 verb in its endings, but it carries two features that make it one of the most instructive verbs at B1. First, it is built into a construction that almost nothing else in the language uses: hlakka til + GENITIVE. Second, it sits at the centre of a famous usage debate — the standard subject is nominative (ég hlakka til), but a great many native speakers say the impersonal *mig hlakkar til with an accusative "subject," a form schools have fought for a century. This page gives the full paradigm, drills the genitive after til, and lays out the ég hlakka vs mig hlakkar question honestly.
Conjugation
Class: weak, Class 1 (the -aði preterite). Auxiliary: hafa — ég hef hlakkað "I have looked forward." The stem vowel is short a, so it takes u-umlaut: a → ö before -u- endings (hlökkum, hlökkuðu). Note also the double -kk- throughout.
| Principal parts | |
|---|---|
| Infinitive | að hlakka |
| 3sg present | hlakkar |
| 3sg past | hlakkaði |
| 3pl past | hlökkuðu |
| Supine | hlakkað |
| Person | Present (nútíð) | Past (þátíð) |
|---|---|---|
| ég | hlakka | hlakkaði |
| þú | hlakkar | hlakkaðir |
| hann / hún / það | hlakkar | hlakkaði |
| við | hlökkum | hlökkuðum |
| þið | hlakkið | hlökkuðuð |
| þeir / þær / þau | hlakka | hlökkuðu |
| Person | Present subjunctive | Past subjunctive |
|---|---|---|
| ég | hlakki | hlakkaði |
| þú | hlakkir | hlakkaðir |
| hann / hún / það | hlakki | hlakkaði |
| við | hlökkum | hlökkuðum |
| þið | hlakkið | hlökkuðuð |
| þeir / þær / þau | hlakki | hlökkuðu |
| Non-finite & imperative | |
|---|---|
| Imperative (þú) | hlakkaðu (til…) |
| Imperative (þið) | hlakkið (til…)! |
| Supine | hlakkað |
| Present participle | hlakkandi |
| Middle voice (miðmynd) | — (not in everyday use) |
hlakka til + GENITIVE — the headline construction
This is the reason the verb deserves its own page. "To look forward to X" is hlakka til + the genitive of X. The preposition til always governs the genitive, and hlakka is locked to til — so the thing you anticipate is always genitive: hlakka til jólanna ("look forward to Christmas," jólin → genitive jólanna), hlakka til helgarinnar ("look forward to the weekend," helgin → helgarinnar), hlakka til sumarsins ("look forward to the summer," sumarið → sumarsins).
This trips up English speakers twice over. English "look forward to" suggests a dative-like or "to"-object, but Icelandic til is a genitive preposition — one of the rare prepositions that puts its noun in the genitive at all. There is no nominative or accusative option here.
Ég hlakka svo til jólanna í ár.
I'm so looking forward to Christmas this year. (hlakka til + genitive jólanna)
Hún hlakkaði til ferðarinnar í margar vikur.
She looked forward to the trip for many weeks. (past 'hlakkaði'; genitive ferðarinnar)
Krakkarnir hlökkuðu til sumarfrísins allan veturinn.
The kids looked forward to the summer holiday all winter long. (past plural 'hlökkuðu' with umlaut; genitive sumarfrísins)
To look forward to doing something, use hlakka til að + infinitive: ég hlakka til að sjá þig ("I look forward to seeing you").
Við hlökkum til að hitta ykkur öll um helgina.
We look forward to seeing you all this weekend. (hlakka til að + infinitive; plural 'hlökkum')
The subject: standard ég hlakka, not *mig hlakkar
Here is the usage debate, stated plainly. In the standard language, hlakka is a normal personal verb with a nominative subject that agrees with it: ég hlakka, þú hlakkar, við hlökkum. But a large share of speakers — across regions and generations — instead treat it as an impersonal verb with an accusative experiencer: *mig hlakkar til, *hana hlakkar til. This pattern (often called part of þágufallssýki / "dative sickness," though here it is accusative) is widespread in speech yet firmly stigmatised: it is corrected in school, edited out of formal writing, and flagged in style guides.
The honest picture: you will hear mig hlakkar til constantly, and it is not a "foreigner's mistake" — it is native. But for your own production, especially in writing and exams, use the nominative standard: ég hlakka til. That form is never wrong; the accusative one always risks correction.
Ég hlakka til helgarinnar.
I'm looking forward to the weekend. (standard nominative subject 'ég' agreeing with 'hlakka')
Hlakkar þig ekki til? — Jú, ég hlakka mikið til.
'Don't you look forward to it?' (heard with accusative þig in speech) — 'Yes, I'm really looking forward to it' (answered in the standard nominative).
Common Mistakes
❌ Ég hlakka til jólin.
Incorrect — til governs the GENITIVE, so it must be 'jólanna', not the nominative/accusative 'jólin'.
✅ Ég hlakka til jólanna.
I'm looking forward to Christmas.
❌ Mig hlakkar til afmælisins.
Non-standard — the standard subject is NOMINATIVE: 'ég hlakka', not the accusative 'mig hlakkar' (stigmatised in writing).
✅ Ég hlakka til afmælisins.
I'm looking forward to the birthday.
❌ Við hlakkum til frísins.
Incorrect — the a-stem umlauts before -u-: it is 'hlökkum', not '*hlakkum'.
✅ Við hlökkum til frísins.
We're looking forward to the holiday.
❌ Ég hlakka til að sjá þú.
Incorrect — after 'til að' + infinitive the object of 'sjá' is accusative: 'þig', not 'þú'.
✅ Ég hlakka til að sjá þig.
I look forward to seeing you.
Key Takeaways
- hlakka / hlakkar / hlakkaði / hlakkað — a regular weak Class-1 verb (double -kk-; u-umlaut hlökkum, hlökkuðu).
- The construction is hlakka til + GENITIVE — til is a genitive preposition, so the anticipated thing is always genitive (til jólanna, til helgarinnar). For actions: hlakka til að
- infinitive.
- The standard subject is nominative: ég hlakka til. The impersonal *mig hlakkar til (accusative experiencer) is widespread in speech but stigmatised and non-standard — recognise it, don't write it.
- Auxiliary is hafa: ég hef hlakkað.
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- vona (to hope)A2 — Full conjugation of the weak Class-1 verb vona (vona / vonaði / vonuðu / vonað), with its o-stem (no umlaut: vonum), the subjunctive-triggering vona að 'hope that', the fixed reply ég vona það, and the related vonast til að 'hope to'.
- langa (to want / long for)A2 — The impersonal accusative-subject verb langa (mig langar / mig langaði): the experiencer is in the ACCUSATIVE while the verb stays frozen in the 3sg langar, plus langa í + accusative for things, langa að + infinitive for actions, and the contrast with vilja.
- The Weak Preterite: -aði, -di, -ði, -tiA2 — How to choose and form the weak past tense — Class-1 -a verbs take -aði (tala → talaði, plural töluðum), Class-2 verbs take the short dental -di/-ði/-ti picked by the preceding sound (reyndi, dæmdi, keypti) — with the full tala paradigm and the 'when in doubt, -aði' default for unknown verbs.
- Genitive Prepositions: til, án, vegna, milli, aukB1 — The prepositions that govern the genitive — til 'to/of', án 'without', vegna 'because of', milli/á milli 'between', auk 'in addition to', innan/utan 'inside/outside of' — with the huge gotcha that til forces a genitive even on place names and people (til Reykjavíkur, til Jóns) and that vegna often follows its noun (mín vegna 'for my sake').
- Accusative-Subject Verbs: mig langar, mig vantar, mig dreymirB1 — The family of Icelandic verbs whose grammatical subject is in the ACCUSATIVE: langa 'want/fancy' (mig langar í / að), vanta 'need/lack' (mig vantar), dreyma 'dream' (mig dreymir), gruna 'suspect' (mig grunar), minna 'recall/seem' (mig minnir), and the ache verbs verkja/svíða — where the experiencer is accusative (mig, þig, hann, hana, okkur) and the verb is frozen in the 3rd person singular, often with the object of desire in a further case after a preposition (mig langar í kaffi).