Kocham cię — "I love you" — is probably the single most-wanted sentence in any language, and in Polish it is also a small grammar lesson. This page covers kochać (imperfective, "to love") and its perfective partner pokochać ("come to love, fall in love with"). The good news up front: kochać is a very easy conjugation — the regular -am / -asz class (kocham, kochasz, kocha…), no stem changes, no traps. The interesting part is the syntax. Kochać takes a direct object in the accusative, and in Kocham cię the object is the accusative clitic cię — not the dative ci. And the reflexive kochać się has two readings — "love each other" and the euphemism "make love" — while kochać się w kimś (+ locative) means "be in love with someone." So this reflexive is not always literally reflexive, and reading it depends on the construction.
Present tense (imperfective kochać)
| Person | Form | English |
|---|---|---|
| ja | kocham | I love |
| ty | kochasz | you love |
| on / ona / ono | kocha | he / she / it loves |
| my | kochamy | we love |
| wy | kochacie | you (pl.) love |
| oni / one | kochają | they love |
This is the easy -am / -asz class (like czytać → czytam, znać → znam): a fixed stem kocha- plus -m, -sz, —, -my, -cie, -ją, with no mutations and no surprises. The 3pl is the regular kochają (not kochą). If you've learned czytam, you already know how to conjugate kocham.
Kocham cię i nigdy o tym nie zapomnę.
I love you and I'll never forget it.
Babcia kocha wszystkie swoje wnuki jednakowo.
Grandma loves all her grandchildren equally.
Oni kochają to swoje stare mieszkanie na Starówce.
They love that old flat of theirs in the Old Town. (3pl → kochają)
Past tense (kochać)
| Subject | Past form | English |
|---|---|---|
| ja (m. / f.) | kochałem / kochałam | I loved |
| ty (m. / f.) | kochałeś / kochałaś | you loved |
| on / ona / ono | kochał / kochała / kochało | he / she / it loved |
| my (vir. / non-vir.) | kochaliśmy / kochałyśmy | we loved |
| wy (vir. / non-vir.) | kochaliście / kochałyście | you (pl.) loved |
| oni / one | kochali / kochały | they loved |
The past stem is kocha-, fully regular. Watch the virile/non-virile split: kochali (men/mixed) vs kochały (women/things). The imperfective past is the natural one for love, an ongoing state: Kochałem ją całe życie "I loved her my whole life."
Kochałam go, ale nie potrafiłam z nim żyć.
I loved him, but I couldn't live with him. (woman speaking)
Dziadkowie kochali się przez sześćdziesiąt lat.
My grandparents loved each other for sixty years. (men/mixed → kochali)
Future and imperative (kochać)
Kochać is imperfective, so the future is the compound będę kochał / kochała ("I will love"):
Będę cię kochać do końca życia.
I'll love you to the end of my life.
(Note: with będę you can use either the infinitive kochać or the participle kochał/kochała — both będę kochać and będę kochała are correct.) The imperative kochaj! is genuinely used — Kochaj swoich bliskich "Love your loved ones," and in the proverb-like Kochaj i rób, co chcesz. The plural is kochajcie!.
Kochaj mnie takim, jaki jestem.
Love me as I am. (addressing a man)
The perfective partner: pokochać
Pokochać is the prefixed perfective (po- + kochać). It is inceptive — the moment love begins: "come to love, fall in love with, grow to love." Because it is perfective, its present-shaped forms are the simple future:
| Person | pokochać — future | English |
|---|---|---|
| ja | pokocham | I'll come to love |
| ty | pokochasz | you'll come to love |
| on / ona / ono | pokocha | he / she / it will come to love |
| my | pokochamy | we'll come to love |
| wy | pokochacie | you (pl.) will come to love |
| oni / one | pokochają | they'll come to love |
| Form | pokochać | English |
|---|---|---|
| past (m./f. 1sg) | pokochałem / pokochałam | I came to love / fell in love |
| past (vir./non-vir. 3pl) | pokochali / pokochały | they came to love |
| imperative (sg / pl) | pokochaj! / pokochajcie! | come to love! / embrace! |
| passive participle | pokochany | (come to be) loved |
Pokochałam to miasto od pierwszego dnia.
I fell in love with this city from the very first day. (woman speaking)
Zobaczysz, na pewno pokochasz nasze góry.
You'll see, you're sure to fall in love with our mountains.
The contemporary adverbial of the imperfective is kochając ("loving"), used in elevated or written style.
Government: kochać + accusative — and the clitic cię
Kochać takes a direct object in the accusative. With nouns this is plain — kocham mojego męża "I love my husband." With pronouns, you use the accusative personal forms, and this is exactly where learners slip:
| "I love…" | Polish | Pronoun (accusative) |
|---|---|---|
| …you (sg) | Kocham cię. | cię (acc.), not ci (dat.) |
| …him | Kocham go. | go |
| …her | Kocham ją. | ją |
| …you all | Kocham was. | was |
The single most common error is kocham ci — but ci is dative ("to you"), and kochać needs the accusative cię. There is no "to" in "I love you," so there is no dative. The clitic cię also normally hugs the verb and avoids sentence-final stressed position; for the stressed/unstressed pronoun system, see clitic and stressed pronouns.
Kocham cię nad życie.
I love you more than life. (cię = accusative)
Ona go kocha, choć nigdy mu tego nie powiedziała.
She loves him, though she's never told him so. (go = accusative; mu = dative for 'told to him')
The reflexive kochać się — not always literally reflexive
Kochać się has two everyday readings, told apart by context, and a third with a preposition:
1. Reciprocal — "love each other" (the się means "one another," not "oneself"):
Kochamy się od liceum i wciąż jesteśmy razem.
We've loved each other since secondary school and we're still together.
2. Euphemistic — "make love" (the same form, disambiguated by context):
W tej scenie bohaterowie kochają się po raz pierwszy.
In this scene the characters make love for the first time. (context → euphemism)
3. kochać się w + locative — "be in love with / have a crush on someone":
Od miesiąca kocha się w nowej koleżance z pracy.
For a month he's been in love with a new colleague at work. (w + locative)
So kochać się is reflexive in form but not in meaning: it's reciprocal, euphemistic, or — with w + locative — "be infatuated with." Real reflexive "love oneself" would be kochać siebie with the full pronoun. For how reflexive się splits into true vs reciprocal uses, see true and reciprocal się.
kochać vs lubić: the intensity gap
Lubić is "like" (a settled fondness); kochać is "love" (deep, usually for people). They are not interchangeable: telling a friend Kocham cię is a strong declaration, while Lubię cię is warm but ordinary. For things and activities, "love" is normally uwielbiać.
Lubię cię jako kolegę, ale jego kocham.
I like you as a friend, but it's him I love.
For the full like/love decision guide, see lubić vs podobać się vs kochać and the lubić reference.
Common Mistakes
❌ Kocham ci.
Incorrect — 'love' takes the accusative cię, not the dative ci ('to you').
✅ Kocham cię.
I love you.
❌ Kocham cię pizzę.
Incorrect — 'kochać' is for deep love (people); for food use uwielbiać.
✅ Uwielbiam pizzę.
I love (adore) pizza.
❌ On kocha w niej. — meaning 'he is in love with her'
Incorrect — 'be in love with' is kochać się w + locative; without się it's just 'he loves'.
✅ On kocha się w niej.
He is in love with her.
❌ Rodzice kochały swoje dzieci. — about a mother and father
Incorrect — a mixed group (men included) takes the virile kochali, not kochały.
✅ Rodzice kochali swoje dzieci.
The parents loved their children.
❌ Zaraz będę pokochał to miejsce.
Incorrect — pokochać is perfective; its bare future pokocham already means 'I'll come to love'. No 'będę' + perfective.
✅ Zaraz pokocham to miejsce.
I'm about to fall in love with this place.
Key Takeaways
- Present: kocham, kochasz, kocha, kochamy, kochacie, kochają — the easy regular -am/-asz class, no stem changes.
- Past: kochał / kochała, virile kochali vs non-virile kochały; future będę kochać / kochała; imperative kochaj!.
- Perfective pokochać = come to love / fall in love: future pokocham … pokochają, past pokochałem, imperative pokochaj!.
- Kochać + accusative. "I love you" is Kocham cię (accusative cię), never kocham ci (that's dative).
- Kochać się = "love each other" or "make love" (context decides); kochać się w + locative = "be in love with."
- Reserve kochać for deep love (people); use uwielbiać for "loving" food, films, and hobbies.
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Start learning Polish→Related Topics
- Reflexive and Reciprocal sięB1 — The two literal uses of się — the subject acting on itself ('myself') and several subjects acting on each other ('each other') — and how się (accusative) differs from sobie (dative) and sam (emphatic).
- lubić — to likeA1 — Full conjugation of lubić / polubić ('like' / 'come to like'): present lubię/lubisz/lubi…/lubią, past lubił, lubić + accusative noun or + infinitive, and how lubić splits from podobać się (the dative 'find appealing').
- Declining Personal Pronouns: Stressed vs Clitic FormsA2 — The full case declension of the Polish personal pronouns, and the crucial split between long stressed forms (mnie, ciebie, jego, tobie) and short unstressed clitics (mi, cię, go, mu) — plus the n-forms (niego, niej, nim) that prepositions force.
- Accusative: The Direct ObjectA1 — The accusative's core job — marking the direct object of a transitive verb — and how that case-marking frees Polish word order in ways English can't.
- lubić vs podobać się vs kochać: Liking and LovingB1 — Three Polish verbs for liking and loving — stable taste (lubić), immediate appeal with an inverted dative subject (podobać się), and love (kochać).