The cari family covers looking for a lost object, seeking information or work, recruiting a person, conducting a search, and searching on someone else's behalf. Its central syntactic fact is simple but important: mencari takes the sought item directly. English says look for a key; Indonesian says mencari kunci, without a preposition corresponding to for.
No person or tense endings
The verb does not agree with its subject or carry tense. Affixes mark voice, valency, or lexical category; separate words mark time and aspect.
| Function | Form | Typical sense |
|---|---|---|
| Instruction/object voice | cari | look for; seek |
| Actor voice | mencari | look for, seek |
| Passive | dicari | be sought, wanted |
| Benefactive actor voice | mencarikan | find/look for something for someone |
| Seeker noun | pencari | seeker, searcher |
| Search noun | pencarian | search, search operation |
| Reduplicated verb | mencari-cari | keep looking, search around; invent |
Saya mencari kunci cadangan di laci ruang depan.
I am looking for the spare key in the front-room drawer.
Kemarin petugas mencari pemilik tas yang tertinggal.
Yesterday the officers looked for the owner of a bag that had been left behind.
Besok kami akan mencari lokasi yang lebih teduh untuk kegiatan luar ruangan.
Tomorrow we will look for a shadier location for the outdoor activity.
English changes look to looked; Indonesian keeps mencari and uses kemarin, akan, sedang, or context. The spelling is mencari and pencari, with the base-initial c retained.
Bare cari: instructions and object voice
Bare cari appears naturally in commands and after a definite first- or second-person agent in object voice. It is not an infinitive that must follow another verb.
Cari tempat berteduh sebelum hujan turun lebih deras.
Find shelter before the rain gets heavier.
Tolong cari nomor telepon bengkel yang buka hari Minggu.
Please find the phone number of a repair shop open on Sunday.
Alamat itu saya cari di arsip lama kelurahan.
I looked for that address in the subdistrict's old records.
Buku apa yang sedang kamu cari di rak sejarah?
What book are you looking for on the history shelves?
Careful actor-oriented prose uses saya mencari alamat itu. Actor-first saya cari is common (informal) speech, but its bare form follows register and voice patterns, not tense.
Mencari takes its object directly
Mencari is transitive. The lost object, desired person, opportunity, answer, or solution comes immediately after it—no untuk is inserted as a translation of English for.
Mira mencari dompetnya sejak selesai makan siang.
Mira has been looking for her wallet since lunch ended.
Perusahaan sedang mencari penerjemah yang fasih berbahasa Jepang.
The company is looking for a translator fluent in Japanese.
Kami mencari informasi tentang jadwal kapal antarpulau.
We are seeking information about the inter-island ferry schedule.
Tim teknis mencari penyebab gangguan jaringan semalam.
The technical team is looking for the cause of last night's network disruption.
An additional phrase can express where, how, or for whose larger purpose the search occurs, but it does not mediate between mencari and its object.
Saya mencari kamar sewa melalui grup warga setempat.
I am looking for a rented room through a local residents' group.
Mereka mencari dana untuk memperbaiki jembatan desa.
They are seeking funds to repair the village bridge.
Here untuk memperbaiki expresses the purpose of the funds; it does not mark dana as the object of searching.
Conventional abstract objects
Several frequent combinations translate idiomatically. Mencari kerja/pekerjaan means seek work, mencari nafkah means earn or seek a livelihood, and mencari jalan keluar means look for a solution or way out.
Setelah lulus, Dimas mencari pekerjaan di bidang kesehatan.
After graduating, Dimas looked for work in the health sector.
Banyak warga pergi ke kota untuk mencari nafkah.
Many residents go to the city to earn a living.
Kedua pihak sepakat mencari jalan keluar tanpa membawa perkara ke pengadilan.
Both parties agreed to seek a solution without taking the matter to court.
Cari muka is (informal) and critical: it means trying to win favor or show off before an authority, not literally looking for a face.
Dia dituduh cari muka di depan atasan barunya.
He was accused of currying favor with his new boss. (informal)
Learn these as collocations; the English gloss does not predict every noun that can follow mencari.
Dicari: make the sought participant central
Passive dicari makes the missing, wanted, or recruited entity the subject. An agent may follow with oleh or be omitted.
Anjing yang hilang itu masih dicari oleh warga sekitar.
The missing dog is still being searched for by local residents.
Dokumen asli sedang dicari di ruang penyimpanan.
The original document is being looked for in the storage room.
Kandidat dengan pengalaman lapangan sangat dicari oleh perusahaan energi.
Candidates with field experience are highly sought after by energy companies.
In notices, Dicari: introduces someone or something wanted. This is a conventional compact passive, often equivalent to wanted or seeking in an advertisement.
Dicari: dua koki untuk restoran baru di pusat kota.
Wanted: two cooks for a new restaurant downtown.
Orang yang paling dicari polisi itu akhirnya menyerahkan diri.
The person most wanted by the police finally surrendered.
Write passive di- solid in dicari, but locative di separately in di ruang penyimpanan.
Mencarikan: search on someone's behalf
Mencarikan adds a beneficiary: the actor searches for or obtains something for another participant. In a beneficiary-first frame, the beneficiary follows the verb and the sought item comes next.
Kakak mencarikan saya pekerjaan sementara selama liburan.
My older sibling found me temporary work during the holiday.
Agen itu mencarikan kliennya rumah dekat sekolah.
That agent found her client a house near the school.
Petugas mencarikan anak tersebut tempat duduk di gerbong depan.
The officer found the child a seat in the front carriage.
Alternatively, the sought item follows directly and the beneficiary appears with untuk.
Kami mencarikan penginapan murah untuk para peserta dari luar kota.
We found inexpensive accommodation for participants from out of town.
Bisakah Anda mencarikan jadwal lain untuk saya?
Could you find another schedule for me?
Plain mencari pekerjaan means the subject seeks work. Mencarikan seseorang pekerjaan makes the search a service performed for that person.
Beneficiary-centered passive is also possible:
Saya dicarikan kamar kos oleh teman sekantor.
A colleague found me a room in a boarding house.
Kamar sementara sudah dicarikan untuk keluarga itu.
Temporary accommodation has already been found for that family.
Pencari and its lexicalized combinations
Pencari names a seeker or searcher, but its most common meanings often come from a following noun. Pencari kerja, pencari suaka, and pencari nafkah are established social and administrative categories.
Pameran itu mempertemukan pencari kerja dengan puluhan perusahaan.
The fair brings job seekers together with dozens of companies.
Layanan hukum gratis tersedia bagi pencari suaka.
Free legal services are available to asylum seekers. (formal)
Ia menjadi pencari nafkah utama setelah ayahnya sakit.
She became the main breadwinner after her father became ill.
These compounds should be learned whole. A pencari nafkah is a breadwinner, not simply someone temporarily searching for wages.
Pencarian: the search process or operation
Pencarian packages searching as a noun. It is common for online searches, investigations, rescue operations, and a prolonged effort to locate something.
Pencarian korban dilanjutkan saat cuaca membaik.
The search for the victims resumed when the weather improved.
Riwayat pencarian dapat dihapus melalui menu pengaturan.
Search history can be deleted through the settings menu.
Tim penyelamat memperluas area pencarian ke arah utara.
The rescue team expanded the search area northward.
Pencarian solusi jangka panjang memerlukan kerja sama lintas lembaga.
The search for a long-term solution requires cooperation across institutions.
Pencari is the participant; pencarian is the activity, operation, record, or process.
Mencari-cari: repeated searching or inventing a pretext
Reduplicated mencari-cari can present an extended, repeated, or indiscriminate search. With nouns such as alasan, kesalahan, and masalah, it often acquires a negative sense: deliberately hunting around for a pretext or fault.
Sejak pagi dia mencari-cari kacamatanya di seluruh rumah.
Since morning she has been looking all over the house for her glasses.
Jangan mencari-cari alasan untuk menunda pekerjaan sederhana itu.
Do not keep inventing excuses to delay that simple task.
Mereka hanya mencari-cari kesalahan kecil dalam laporan lawannya.
They are merely hunting for minor faults in their opponent's report.
The negative interpretation is lexical and contextual, not an automatic meaning of reduplication. With a lost object, the phrase can simply emphasize continued searching. See iterative verb reduplication for the general pattern.
Common Mistakes
Copying English for into the object frame
❌ Saya mencari untuk kunci kamar sejak tadi.
Incorrect — mencari takes the sought object directly.
✅ Saya mencari kunci kamar sejak selesai sarapan.
I have been looking for the room key since breakfast.
Using mencari when the discovery is achieved
❌ Setelah memeriksa peta, kami mencari alamat yang benar.
Incorrect for an achieved result — mencari profiles the search process.
✅ Setelah memeriksa peta, kami menemukan alamat yang benar.
After checking the map, we found the correct address.
Omitting -kan in a beneficiary-first frame
❌ Agen itu mencari kami apartemen murah.
Incorrect for the intended ‘find us an apartment’ structure.
✅ Agen itu mencarikan kami apartemen murah dekat kampus.
The agent found us an inexpensive apartment near campus.
Confusing seeker and search
❌ Pencari kapal yang hilang dihentikan saat badai datang.
Incorrect noun for the search operation — pencari is a person who searches.
✅ Pencarian kapal yang hilang dihentikan saat badai datang.
The search for the missing boat was halted when the storm arrived.
Separating passive di-
❌ Berkas itu masih di cari oleh bagian keuangan.
Incorrect spelling — passive di- attaches to cari.
✅ Berkas itu masih dicari oleh bagian keuangan.
The finance department is still looking for the file.
Key Takeaways
- Mencari takes the sought object directly: mencari kunci, never mencari untuk kunci.
- Bare cari occurs in instructions and object voice; dicari makes the sought or wanted entity central.
- Mencarikan adds a beneficiary in either a beneficiary-first frame or an untuk phrase.
- Pencari names a seeker, while pencarian names the search process or operation.
- Mencari-cari emphasizes extended searching and is often negative with alasan or kesalahan.
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