English "-ing" is a workhorse: it builds the progressive (I am reading), it turns verbs into nouns (reading is fun), and it forms participles (the reading lamp). Norwegian has no single equivalent, and trying to manufacture one is the source of a whole family of learner errors. The good news is that each job the "-ing" does is handled by something simpler. This page sorts those jobs out: the simple present for ongoing action, the bare infinitive for the gerund-noun, and the holde på å / drive og idiom for an action explicitly in progress.
"I am reading" = the simple present
This is the headline. Norwegian does not mark ongoing action with a special tense. The plain present covers both "I read" (habit) and "I am reading" (right now). There is no jeg er lesende for "I am reading" — that construction simply does not exist in everyday Norwegian.
| Norwegian | English (both readings) |
|---|---|
| jeg leser | I read / I am reading |
| hun jobber | she works / she is working |
| vi spiser | we eat / we are eating |
Hva gjør du? — Jeg leser.
What are you doing? — I'm reading.
Vent litt, jeg lager middag akkurat nå.
Hang on, I'm making dinner right now.
Hun snakker i telefonen — kan du ringe senere?
She's on the phone — can you call back later?
In each case the bare present carries the "right now" meaning that English forces into "am/is + -ing." Context (or a word like akkurat nå, "right now") makes the progressive reading clear. You never add a form of være ("to be") in front.
The gerund-noun = the bare infinitive
In English, "-ing" also turns a verb into a noun that can be a subject or object: Swimming is healthy, I like reading. Norwegian uses the infinitive (with its marker å) for exactly this job. Where English nominalises with "-ing," Norwegian nominalises with å + verb.
Å svømme er sunt.
Swimming is healthy.
Jeg liker å lese.
I like reading.
Å lære et nytt språk tar tid.
Learning a new language takes time.
Han er flink til å lage mat.
He's good at cooking.
So the English gerund maps cleanly: wherever you'd use "-ing" as a noun, Norwegian uses å + the infinitive. Swimming → å svømme; reading → å lese; cooking → å lage mat. This is the mirror image of the progressive rule: there you drop extra machinery (no være), here you use the infinitive marker å.
A subtlety worth noting: after prepositions, English uses "-ing" (good at cooking, tired of waiting), and Norwegian still uses the infinitive — but the infinitive marker is often introduced by a linking word like til or med. Flink til å lage mat ("good at cooking"), lei av å vente ("tired of waiting"). The verb itself stays an infinitive; only the connective changes.
Explicitly "in the middle of doing": holde på å / drive og
Sometimes you genuinely want to stress that an action is in progress — caught mid-stream, interruptible. English leans on the progressive for this, but since Norwegian's present is tense-neutral, it has dedicated idioms for "to be in the middle of doing." The two most common are holde på å + infinitive and drive og + present verb.
Jeg holder på å lese — kan det vente fem minutter?
I'm in the middle of reading — can it wait five minutes?
Hun holdt på å lage middag da telefonen ringte.
She was busy making dinner when the phone rang.
Vi driver og pusser opp badet for tida.
We're (in the process of) renovating the bathroom these days.
Holde på å (literally "hold on to") frames an action as ongoing and uninterrupted; it's the natural choice when something interrupts you mid-task. Drive og (literally "drive and") + a present-tense verb does similar work, often for a drawn-out, ongoing project. Both are verbal, not participial — there's no "-ing" form lurking inside them. This idiom is exactly the everyday "be in the middle of doing" that English speakers go looking for and don't find, so it's worth adopting actively.
The -ende form exists — but only as an adjective
Norwegian does have a present-participle form ending in -ende (lesende "reading", løpende "running"). But — and this is the key restriction — it functions as an adjective, describing a noun, not as a verb building a progressive tense.
En lesende mann satt ved vinduet.
A reading man sat by the window.
Hun kom løpende mot oss.
She came running towards us.
You can say en lesende mann ("a reading man") because lesende modifies mann like an adjective. But you cannot say jeg er lesende to mean "I am reading" — the -ende form does not partner with være to make a progressive. It only describes nouns (and a few set adverbial phrases like kom løpende). This is precisely the boundary English speakers cross by accident: they take a real Norwegian form (lesende) and plug it into a slot (jeg er _) where it doesn't belong. The full adjectival use is covered in verbs/present-participle; for now, just keep -ende out of your verb tenses.
Putting the three jobs side by side
| English "-ing" job | Norwegian solution | Example |
|---|---|---|
| progressive ("am reading") | simple present | jeg leser |
| emphatic "in the middle of" | holde på å / drive og | jeg holder på å lese |
| gerund-noun ("reading is fun") | infinitive (å + verb) | å lese er gøy |
| adjective ("a reading lamp") | -ende participle | en lesende mann |
Three different jobs, three different solutions — and crucially, none of them is "være + -ende." That non-existent construction is the one thing to unlearn.
Common Mistakes
❌ Jeg er lesende en bok.
Incorrect — invented progressive with være + -ende.
✅ Jeg leser en bok.
I'm reading a book.
There is no være + participle progressive. The simple present jeg leser already means "I am reading."
❌ Jeg er gående til jobben.
Incorrect — same invented progressive on a motion verb.
✅ Jeg går til jobben.
I'm walking to work. / I walk to work.
Again, no er + -ende. Jeg går covers both "I walk" and "I am walking." (If you must stress in-progress, jeg holder på å gå — but the plain present is normal.)
❌ Svømmende er sunt.
Incorrect — participle used as a noun subject.
✅ Å svømme er sunt.
Swimming is healthy.
For the gerund-noun ("swimming" as a subject), use the infinitive å svømme, not the -ende participle.
❌ Jeg liker lesing av bøker.
Awkward — over-nominalised; not how the gerund works here.
✅ Jeg liker å lese bøker.
I like reading books.
"I like reading" is jeg liker å lese — infinitive, not a noun. (Norwegian does have some -ing nouns like lesing, but they are specific derived nouns, not the all-purpose gerund English uses.)
Key Takeaways
- Norwegian has no all-purpose "-ing" form; each "-ing" job is handled separately.
- Progressive ("am reading") = the simple present: jeg leser. No være added.
- Gerund-noun ("reading is fun") = the infinitive: å lese er gøy.
- Explicitly in-progress = holde på å
- infinitive or drive og
- verb: jeg holder på å lese.
- infinitive or drive og
- The -ende participle exists only as an adjective (en lesende mann) — never jeg er lesende.
- The cardinal error to unlearn: there is no være
- -ende progressive.
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Start learning Norwegian→Related Topics
- The Present Tense (-r)A1 — How to form the Norwegian present tense — add -r to the infinitive, one form for every person — and how it routinely expresses the future with a time word.
- Uses of the InfinitiveB1 — The syntactic jobs of the Norwegian infinitive beyond modals — as subject (å lære norsk er gøy), object (jeg liker å lese), after prepositions (uten å si noe), in purpose clauses (for å vinne), after adjectives (lett å si), and the perfect infinitive (etter å ha spist) — anchored by the key fact that Norwegian has no -ing gerund.
- Expressing Ongoing Action: holde på, drive og, sitte ogB1 — Norwegian has no '-ing' tense — how holde på (å), drive og/med and the posture-verb og pattern (sitte og lese) express action in progress.
- Forcing an -ing ProgressiveA2 — Norwegian has no progressive tense and no gerund — the plain present already means 'am V-ing' (jeg leser = I read / I am reading) and the infinitive covers the -ing noun (å svømme er sunt) — so the fix is to stop building an English-style 'to be + -ing'.