svare means to answer / to reply. It is a regular weak Class 2 verb (svare / svarer / svarte / svart), and the single most important thing to learn about it is its preposition: you answer a question with svare på, not svare for. Norwegian and English carve up "answer" slightly differently, and the på is where learners stumble. Get svare på into your ear and the rest of the verb falls into place.
Conjugation
Class: weak Class 2 (endings -te / -t). Auxiliary: ha.
| Tense / mood | Norwegian | English |
|---|---|---|
| Infinitiv | å svare | to answer |
| Presens | svarer | answer(s) |
| Preteritum | svarte | answered |
| Perfektum | har svart | have/has answered |
| Pluskvamperfektum | hadde svart | had answered |
| Futurum | skal/vil svare | will answer |
| Imperativ | svar! | answer! |
| Presens partisipp | svarende | answering (adjective) |
svare på — answering a question
The headline collocation is svare på: you answer on a question, a letter, an email. Where English says "answer the question" with a direct object, Norwegian inserts på before the thing being answered.
- Svar på spørsmålet. — Answer the question.
- Hun svarte ikke på e-posten. — She didn't reply to the email.
This is not svare for — that means something else entirely (see below). And it is not a bare object either: you don't *svare spørsmålet. The thing you respond to takes på.
Kan du svare på spørsmålet mitt, er du snill?
Can you answer my question, please?
Hun svarte ikke på meldingen før neste dag.
She didn't reply to the message until the next day.
Jeg har ikke svart på invitasjonen ennå.
I haven't replied to the invitation yet.
Svar på e-posten før du går for dagen.
Reply to the email before you leave for the day.
svare noen — answering a person
When the object is the person you reply to (rather than the question), they can stand directly after the verb with no preposition — svare noen.
- Hun svarte meg ikke. — She didn't answer me.
- Læreren svarte elevene høflig. — The teacher answered the pupils politely.
So both patterns live side by side: you svarer noen (a person, direct) but svarer på noe (a question/letter, with på). They can even combine: Han svarte meg på spørsmålet — "He answered my question (to me)."
Hvorfor svarer du meg ikke? Jeg har ringt fem ganger.
Why won't you answer me? I've called five times.
Han svarte oss aldri på det vi spurte om.
He never answered us about what we asked.
svare til — to correspond to / match
A separate sense: svare til means "to correspond to / match / live up to." This is the formal verb for things matching expectations, descriptions, or amounts. It is the register-neutral way to say one figure equals another, and a slightly elevated way to say something met (or failed to meet) a standard.
Resultatet svarte ikke til forventningene. (formal)
The result did not live up to expectations.
Beløpet svarer til omtrent hundre euro.
The amount corresponds to roughly a hundred euros.
Why Norwegian needs the preposition
English lets "answer" take its object bare — answer the phone, answer the question, answer the letter — because English has quietly absorbed the relationship into the verb itself. Norwegian keeps that relationship visible with på: you answer onto the thing you're responding to. Think of på here as marking the target your reply lands on. This is the same logic you meet in svare på et brev (answer a letter), svare på et anrop (answer a call), and svare på kritikk (respond to criticism) — in every case the response is aimed at something, and Norwegian spells that aim out with på.
Once you internalise that, you can predict the preposition for verbs you have never seen: if the verb is about directing something at a target, Norwegian very often reaches for på. svare is one of the cleanest examples of the pattern, which is why it is worth drilling early.
Politikeren nektet å svare på spørsmålet fra journalisten.
The politician refused to answer the journalist's question.
Vennligst svar på henvendelsen innen tre virkedager. (formal)
Please respond to the inquiry within three business days.
Common Mistakes
❌ Kan du svare for spørsmålet?
Incorrect — to answer a question use svare på; svare for means 'be responsible for'
✅ Kan du svare på spørsmålet?
Can you answer the question?
❌ Hun svarte spørsmålet med en gang.
Incorrect — the question takes på; you don't answer it as a bare object
✅ Hun svarte på spørsmålet med en gang.
She answered the question right away.
❌ Han svaret ikke på e-posten.
Incorrect — svare is Class 2; the preterite is svarte, not svaret
✅ Han svarte ikke på e-posten.
He didn't reply to the email.
❌ Jeg har svarte på alle spørsmålene.
Incorrect — svarte is the preterite; after har use the supine svart
✅ Jeg har svart på alle spørsmålene.
I've answered all the questions.
Key Takeaways
- svare / svarer / svarte / har svart / svar! — weak Class 2, endings -te / -t.
- Answer a question/letter with svare på (never svare for, never a bare object).
- A person can be a direct object: svare noen.
- svare til = correspond to / match; svare for = be responsible for. The supine svart is a homograph of svart ("black") — context disambiguates.
Now practice Norwegian
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Start learning Norwegian→Related Topics
- Weak Verbs: The Four ClassesA2 — A map of the four regular Norwegian past-tense classes (-et/-a, -te, -de, -dde) — how to predict a verb's class from its stem and how the supine differs from the preterite.
- Verb Reference: How to Use These TablesA2 — How to read the Norwegian verb-reference pages — the five principal parts, weak vs strong classes, and the supine (the har-form).
- Verbs with Fixed PrepositionsB1 — Verbs that govern a fixed, unpredictable preposition you must memorise as a unit: vente på (wait for), tenke på (think about), lete etter (look for), be om (ask for), glede seg til (look forward to), bestemme seg for (decide on) — where the Norwegian preposition almost never matches English.
- i vs på: PlaceA2 — The full systematic range of i (inside, countries, cities) vs på (surfaces, institutions-as-activity, islands, many towns) for location — with the collocation lists you must memorise.