brinna is the Swedish verb "to burn" in the intransitive sense — to be on fire, to be alight: huset brinner, "the house is on fire." It is a strong verb of the i–a–u type, with principal parts brinna – brann – brunnit, the very same shape as sjunga – sjöng – sjungit's sister pattern and exactly like vinna – vann – vunnit ("win") and finna – fann – funnit ("find"). The single most important thing about brinna is that it cannot take an object: the fire burns, the candle burns, the forest burns. To burn something — toast, your hand, a CD — you need a different verb entirely: the transitive, weak bränna (bränna – brände – bränt). Mixing them up is the classic English-speaker error, because English uses one word "burn" for both.
Principal parts
| Infinitive | Present | Preteritum (past) | Supine | Imperative | Group |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| brinna | brinner | brann | brunnit | brinn | Group 4 (strong), i–a–u |
Track the vowels: infinitive and present in i (brinna, brinner), past in a (brann), supine in u (brunnit). This i–a–u walk mirrors English begin – began – begun and swim – swam – swum, so the pattern should feel familiar — Swedish just keeps it tidy and predictable here. The agreeing past participle brunnen / brunnet / brunna ("burnt out, scorched") shows up in nedbrunnen ("burned down"): ett nedbrunnet hus, "a burned-down house."
Brasan brinner fortfarande, men snart är veden slut.
The fire is still burning, but the firewood will soon run out. brinner — present, intransitive.
Ladan brann ner till grunden på en timme.
The barn burned to the ground in an hour. brann — past, vowel a.
Det har brunnit i skogen norr om stan i flera dagar.
There's been a fire in the forest north of town for several days. har brunnit — perfect, supine vowel u.
Use 1: present, past and perfect
The three tenses follow the principal parts. The present brinner covers both "burns" and "is burning." The past brann is the bare vowel-changed stem with a. The perfect is har brunnit; the pluperfect hade brunnit.
Stearinljusen brinner på bordet hela kvällen.
The candles burn on the table all evening. brinner — present, intransitive.
Elden brann hela natten innan brandkåren fick stopp på den.
The fire burned all night before the fire brigade got it under control. brann — past, vowel a.
När vi kom fram hade hela kvarteret redan brunnit.
When we arrived, the whole block had already burned. hade brunnit — pluperfect, supine brunnit.
Use 2: the heart of it — brinna (intransitive) vs bränna (transitive)
This is the point to drill. brinna is intransitive: a thing is on fire, with no doer acting on an object. bränna is transitive: someone burns something. And bränna is weak (Group 2), so it conjugates completely differently — bränna – bränner – brände – bränt — with a -de/-t ending, no vowel change. Compare:
Soppan brinner inte, men jag brände den i botten.
The soup isn't on fire, but I burned it on the bottom. brinner (intr., strong) vs brände (tr., weak).
Var försiktig, du bränner dig på plattan!
Be careful, you'll burn yourself on the hotplate! bränner — transitive, weak; takes the object dig.
Huset brann, och gnistorna brände hål i grannens markis.
The house burned, and the sparks burned holes in the neighbour's awning. brann (intr.) and brände (tr.) side by side.
Use 3: figurative — brinna för, brinna upp
brinna för (något) is the warm idiom "to be passionate about, burn for" a cause or interest — your eyes light up, you care intensely. The particle verb brinna upp means "to burn up / burn down completely" (intransitive: the thing is consumed by fire).
Hon brinner verkligen för klimatfrågan.
She is genuinely passionate about the climate issue. brinna för — 'be passionate about'.
Han brann för musiken redan som barn.
He was passionate about music even as a child. brann för — past.
Hela arkivet brann upp i branden förra året.
The whole archive burned up in the fire last year. brann upp — past, 'burned down completely'.
Common Mistakes
❌ Jag brann brödet i ugnen. (using intransitive brinna with an object)
Incorrect — brinna can't take an object. To burn *something* you need the transitive bränna: jag brände brödet.
✅ Jag brände brödet i ugnen.
I burned the bread in the oven.
❌ Huset bränner! (using transitive bränna for a thing on fire)
Incorrect — a thing that is on fire by itself takes the intransitive brinna: huset brinner.
✅ Huset brinner!
The house is on fire!
❌ Ladan brinnade ner. (regularising the strong verb)
Incorrect — brinna is strong and takes no -ade ending. The past is the vowel-changed brann.
✅ Ladan brann ner.
The barn burned down.
❌ Det har brann hela natten. (using the past instead of the supine)
Incorrect — after har you need the supine brunnit, not the past brann.
✅ Det har brunnit hela natten.
It has been burning all night.
Related Topics
- Index of Strong Verbs by PatternB1 — A navigable index of the common Swedish strong verbs, grouped by ablaut pattern rather than alphabetically — i–e–i (skriva/skrev/skrivit), i–a–u (dricka/drack/druckit), a–o–a (ta/tog/tagit), and the irregular/contracted set (gå/gick/gått). Each group is a four-part table of principal parts with English cognate hints, because organising strong verbs by shared vowel pattern turns a scary list into a few learnable families.
- Strong Verbs: Overview and Principal PartsB1 — Strong verbs (Group 4) don't add a past-tense ending — they change their stem vowel across three principal parts: skriva–skrev–skrivit. The vowel moves in recurring patterns (ablaut) that Swedish shares with English: i–a–u is the same machinery as sing–sang–sung. This page teaches you to read principal parts, recognise the classes, and leverage the English cognate vowels so memorisation becomes pattern-recognition.
- Supine vs Past ParticipleB1 — The single Swedish verb-form distinction English has no equivalent for: the supine (har skrivit — fixed, invariable, only after ha) versus the past participle (en skriven bok, ett skrivet brev, skrivna böcker — fully agreeing, used as adjective and in the passive). English collapses both into one '-en' word; Swedish splits them, and confusing the two (*har skriven, *en skrivit bok) is a hallmark learner error.