wychodzić / wyjść and the iść prefix family

This page gives the complete conjugation of the pair wychodzić (imperfective) / wyjść (perfective), "to go out / leave on foot", and then uses it as a key to unlock an entire family. Once you can conjugate one iść-based prefixed verb, you can conjugate them all — and the prefix tells you the direction. This is one of the highest-leverage things you can learn in Polish: a single irregular root, dressed in six prefixes, gives you a precise verb of motion for nearly every "go" situation in daily life.

The big idea: one root, six directions

Polish builds directional motion verbs by gluing a prefix onto the base verb of going-on-foot. The unprefixed base iść (determinate, "to be going") has the irregular present stem idę / idziesz and the irregular past szedł / szła. Every prefixed perfective inherits exactly that irregularity — you only have to learn the prefix and then attach the forms you already know.

The prefix carries the direction:

English has no equivalent of this system. We bolt direction on with separate particles and prepositions — "go out", "come in", "go across" — but the verb "go" stays the same and is not itself perfective or imperfective. In Polish the prefix does double duty: it gives the direction and it makes the verb perfective. That is why these are aspect pairs and not just synonyms.

wychodzić (imperfective) — full conjugation

wychodzić describes the action of going out as a process, a habit, or a repeated event: "I leave at eight every day", "she was just going out when…". Use it for habits, for ongoing or interrupted actions, and after phase and modal verbs.

Present tense

Past tense (gendered)

The past keeps the regular -chodzić stem (no irregularity here — that lives in the perfective). Endings agree with gender and number.

Note the masculine-personal plural form wychodzili (a group including at least one man) versus the non-masculine-personal wychodziły (women, children, animals, objects).

Imperative

The imperfective imperative often sounds like an order to start/keep doing something or a repeated instruction: Wychodź! can mean "Get out!" (keep moving out, now).

Participles

• Contemporary adverbial participle: wychodząc ("while going out").
• Active adjectival participle: wychodzący / wychodząca / wychodzące ("the one going out", "outgoing").

wyjść (perfective) — full conjugation

wyjść describes a single completed exit: "I went out", "I'll step out for a moment". Because it is perfective, its present-tense forms function as the simple future.

Simple future (perfective)

This is where the irregular wyjd- stem appears — inherited directly from iść (idę).

Past tense (gendered) — irregular szedł/szła root

This is the trap. The perfective past is built on the irregular iść past, which alternates -szedł (masculine singular) with -szł- everywhere else.

Imperative

Passive participle

Motion verbs like wyjść are intransitive, so they have no passive participle. (You cannot "be gone out" by someone.) This is normal for the whole family — none of these intransitive motion verbs forms a passive.

The rest of the family at a glance

Every pair below conjugates exactly like wychodzić / wyjść. The imperfective follows wychodzić (regular -chodzę, -chodzisz); the perfective future follows wyjdę (irregular -jdę, -jdziesz, -jdą); the perfective past follows wyszedł / wyszła (the -szedł/-szł- trap). Watch the spelling of the perfective infinitives and futures.

Several of these have rich figurative lives that English handles with completely different words: odejść can mean "to pass away", dojść can mean "to come to a conclusion" (dojść do wniosku), przejść can mean "to go through / undergo" (przejść operację). The directional logic still whispers underneath: od- = away (from life), do- = up to (a conclusion), prze- = through (an experience).

Common Mistakes

Key Takeaways

• The imperfective member of every pair ends in -chodzić and conjugates regularly; the perfective ends in -jść and inherits the irregular idę / szedł / szła forms of iść.
• The prefix encodes direction: przy- toward, wy- out, do- up to, od- away, prze- across, z- down.
• The biggest hazard is the masculine-singular past with its fleeting -e-: wyszedł but wyszła / wyszło / wyszli / wyszły.
• Perfectives form the simple future from their present-tense forms (wyjdę = "I will go out"); never combine them with będę.
• Two prefixes pad with -e- before the j: odejdę / odejść and zejdę / zejść.