böra, ska, lär (should, ought, supposedly) | Swedish Grammar

English uses should and ought to for advice, and supposedly or is said to for things it has only heard secondhand. Swedish covers the same ground with three small modals — böra, ska, and lär — and the surprise for English speakers is that two of them (ska and lär) carry a built-in "I'm only reporting this" flavour. That meaning is called evidentiality: the verb itself signals that the information is hearsay. This page sorts the advice-giving böra from the rumour-reporting ska and lär, so you know not just what each one means but where the speaker's confidence sits.

böra: advice and "ought to"

böra is the gentle obligation verb — the one for advice, recommendations, and "you really ought to." It is almost never used as a full verb; in practice you only meet two forms:

Form	Swedish	English	Note
present	bör	should / ought to	slightly firmer, more written
past	borde	should / ought to	the everyday spoken form
supine	(bort)	—	theoretically har bort, but effectively never used

Like every Swedish modal, böra is followed by a bare infinitive — no att.

Du bör vila om du är förkyld.

You should rest if you have a cold. bör + bare infinitive 'vila' — firm, sensible advice, slightly more formal in tone.

Du borde sova mer — du ser trött ut.

You ought to sleep more — you look tired. borde is the warm, everyday 'should' you'd say to a friend.

The two forms are not really a present/past contrast. borde is the softer, more polite of the two — it frames the advice as a suggestion the listener is free to weigh, while bör sounds a touch more like a rule or a strong recommendation. In spoken Swedish, borde is what you reach for by default.

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Use borde as your everyday "should." It is past in form but not in meaning — Du borde äta något = "You should eat something" (right now), not "You should have eaten." For the genuine past "should have," you need borde ha + supine: Du borde ha ätit ("You should have eaten").

Vi borde ha bokat bord — nu är det fullt.

We should have booked a table — now it's full. borde ha + supine 'bokat' = past regret, 'should have done'.

ska: the hearsay reading

You already know ska as the future/intention verb (Jag ska resa imorgon, "I'm going to travel tomorrow"). But ska has a second, separate job that catches learners off guard: it reports what other people say. When ska takes a stative meaning — describing how things are rather than what someone will do — it usually means "is said to / is reputed to / supposedly."

Han ska vara väldigt rik.

He's said to be very rich. NOT 'he is going to be rich' — with a stative verb, ska reports a rumour: 'apparently / reputedly'.

Hon ska ha flyttat till Berlin.

She's supposedly moved to Berlin. ska ha + supine = reported past: 'I hear she has moved', not a prediction.

Den nya restaurangen ska vara fantastisk.

The new restaurant is supposed to be fantastic. ska vara = 'people say it's' — you're passing on what you've heard.

The clue is the verb that follows. Ska resa, ska ringa, ska börja (dynamic actions) read as future or intention. Ska vara, ska ha, ska kunna (states and "have") slide into the hearsay reading. English has no single modal for this — it falls back on is said to, is supposed to, apparently, or reputedly.

lär: pure "reportedly"

lär is the most concentrated hearsay verb in Swedish. It does little else: lär + bare infinitive means "reportedly," "I gather," "by all accounts." It is invariable in this use — there is no meaningful past form for the evidential sense — and it never carries an obligation meaning at all.

Det lär bli kallt i helgen.

It's reportedly going to be cold this weekend. lär bli = 'word is it'll be cold' — you heard it, e.g. from the forecast.

Han lär vara mycket duktig på matte.

He's said to be very good at maths. lär vara = 'by all accounts he's good' — passing on a reputation, not your own judgement.

Filmen lär vara värd att se.

The film is supposedly worth seeing. A neat, slightly bookish way to relay a recommendation you didn't form yourself.

lär leans a little more formal and written than ska-hearsay, but it is alive in ordinary speech, especially when relaying news, gossip, or reputation. Note one trap: lära (sig) "to learn / teach" is a different verb entirely — Jag lär mig svenska ("I'm learning Swedish") has nothing to do with the evidential lär.

The confidence ladder

Lining these up against the stronger modals shows what each one is really doing. The left column is how sure / how forceful the speaker is:

Swedish	English	What it signals
måste	must / have to	hard necessity (see the strong modals)
bör	should / ought to	firm recommendation
borde	should / ought to	gentle advice, free to ignore
ska (+ state)	is said to / supposedly	hearsay — you heard it
lär	reportedly / by all accounts	hearsay — you heard it

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The big mental shift: borde sits on the advice axis (how strongly I recommend it), while ska and lär sit on the evidence axis (where I got this information). They are not weaker versions of "must" — lär says nothing about obligation. It only tells you the speaker is relaying second-hand information.

Why ska splits into two meanings

The hearsay reading isn't random. Ska originally meant "is bound to / is owed," and from "X is bound to be the case" it is a short hop to "X is reputedly the case." When the following verb is dynamic (ska resa), the "bound to happen" sense surfaces as future. When it is stative (ska vara rik), there is nothing to "happen," so the only sensible reading is "is reputed to be" — the speaker is reporting a state they cannot personally vouch for. Once you see that the verb type decides the reading, you stop mis-hearing Han ska vara rik as a prediction.

Common Mistakes

❌ Du måste sova mer.

Incorrect for friendly advice — måste is hard necessity ('you have to'), too strong for a suggestion.

✅ Du borde sova mer.

You ought to sleep more — borde is the right strength for advice.

❌ Han ska vara rik. (read as 'he is going to be rich')

Incorrect reading — with the stative 'vara', ska means 'is said to be', not a prediction.

✅ Han ska vara rik. = 'He's said to be rich.'

Same words, hearsay meaning — the stative verb triggers the 'supposedly' reading.

❌ Du borde att vila.

Incorrect — modals take a BARE infinitive, never 'att'.

✅ Du borde vila.

You ought to rest.

❌ Du borde sova mer igår.

Incorrect — for a past 'should have', you need borde HA + supine.

✅ Du borde ha sovit mer igår.

You should have slept more yesterday.

❌ Det ska regna imorgon, lär jag mig.

Incorrect — that's 'lära sig' (to learn). Evidential 'lär' goes before the verb: 'Det lär regna imorgon.'

✅ Det lär regna imorgon.

It's reportedly going to rain tomorrow.

Key Takeaways

borde is your everyday "should / ought to" for advice; bör is its slightly firmer, more written sibling. Both take a bare infinitive.
For past regret ("should have"), use borde ha
- supine: Du borde ha frågat.
ska has a hidden second life: with a stative verb it means "is said to / supposedly" (Han ska vara rik), not future.
lär is dedicated hearsay — "reportedly, by all accounts" (Det lär bli kallt) — and never expresses obligation. Don't confuse it with lära sig, "to learn."
The key axis: borde = how strong the advice is; ska/lär = where the information came from. English splits these across should, supposedly, and is said to.

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