Non-Fiction: A Public Announcement (Оголошення)

The оголо́шення ("announcement, notice") is one of the first real-world texts a learner can read end to end: short, formulaic, and everywhere — taped to a lift, pinned to a noticeboard, posted in a building chat. But it runs on a compact grammar that beginner courses skip: dates and times in their special cases, imperative or infinitive directives, fixed contact formulas, and the impersonal -но/-то that lets a notice state facts with no visible author. Master these and you can read — and write — any ordinary Ukrainian notice. Below are two authentic-style notices in standard Ukrainian.

The texts

1. A lost-item notice

Оголо́шення. Загу́блено гамане́ць чо́рного ко́льору з докуме́нтами на ім’я́ Петре́нко О. В. Знайде́но бі́ля ма́газину «Сільпо́» на вул. Шевче́нка. Announcement. A black wallet with documents in the name of Petrenko O. V. has been lost. Found near the "Silpo" shop on Shevchenko Street.

Проха́ння пове́рнути за винагоро́ду. Звертайтеся за телефо́ном 097-123-45-67 (Окса́на) або пиші́ть у месе́нджер. Please return it for a reward. Contact us at 097-123-45-67 (Oksana) or write on the messenger.

2. An event notice

Ува́га! 15 че́рвня о 18:00 у бібліоте́ці на́шого мікрорайо́ну відбу́деться зу́стріч із письме́нницею Окса́ною Забу́жко. Attention! On 15 June at 18:00, a meeting with the writer Oksana Zabuzhko will take place in our district library.

Вхід ві́льний. Запро́шуються всі охо́чі. Реєстра́ція не потрі́бна. Дода́ткову інформа́цію мо́жна отри́мати на сторі́нці бібліоте́ки. Admission is free. Everyone interested is invited. No registration required. Additional information can be obtained on the library's page.

(These are original, authentic-style notices written for this page in standard Ukrainian.)

Line-by-line grammar

Загу́блено / Знайде́но — the impersonal -но/-то

A notice rarely names who did anything, and the -но/-то form is how Ukrainian achieves that. Загу́блено = "(it) has been lost" and Знайде́но = "(it) has been found" — both are impersonal, invariable forms built from the passive participle (загу́блений → загу́блено, зна́йдений → знайде́но). There is no subject and no agent: the wallet simply got lost and got found, with nobody blamed or credited. The tell-tale sign is the object — Загу́блено гамане́ць keeps the wallet in the accusative, not the nominative — exactly as in news prose. This agentless statement of fact is the default register of public notices.

For the full construction, see The -но/-то Impersonal.

15 че́рвня о 18:00 — the date and time in their cases

Times and dates are where notices trip learners up, because each has its own case.

• The date: «15 че́рвня» = "on 15 June." The day is an ordinal in the genitive (п’ятна́дцятого, here written as the numeral 15), and the month is genitive too: че́рвень → че́рвня. There is no preposition — the bare genitive means "on (this date)." Spelled out: п’ятна́дцятого че́рвня.
• The clock time: «о 18:00» = "at 18:00." The preposition о (before a consonant; об before a vowel) governs the locative and means "at (a clock time)": о шо́стій (годи́ні), о во́сьмій, о пе́ршій. With the 24-hour clock you read it as о вісімна́дцятій (годи́ні).

This о + locative for clock times is one of the highest-value patterns in the whole language for everyday life.

For clock times in detail, see Telling the Time; for dates, see Dates, Years and Centuries; for the locative more broadly, Uses of the Locative.

відбу́деться / запро́шуються — the reflexive-passive in -ся

Two verbs carry the event notice, both reflexive in -ся, and both deeply typical of the register:

• відбу́деться ("will take place") — the perfective future of відбу́тися, the standard verb for an event "happening / being held." It is intransitive and agentless: the meeting takes place, with no one staged as organiser.
• запро́шуються ("are invited") — a reflexive passive: запро́шувати ("to invite") + -ся turns active into passive, so запро́шуються всі охо́чі = "all who wish are invited," with the inviter left unnamed. This -ся passive is a hallmark of formal, announcement-style Ukrainian.

On these subjectless, agent-hiding constructions, see Reflexive-Passive: A Deep Dive and Impersonal Constructions.

Звертайтеся / пиші́ть / пове́рнути — directives: imperative and infinitive

A notice tells you what to do, and it has two registers for it:

• The polite imperative (2nd person plural, the formal ви form): Звертайтеся ("contact [us], apply") and пиші́ть ("write"). The plural -іть / -ться here is the formal/respectful "you" addressed to any reader — a notice never says ти. Звертайтеся за телефо́ном… ("contact [us] at the phone number…") is the single most common contact formula in Ukrainian notices.
• The bare infinitive as a softened directive: Проха́ння пове́рнути = "[there is a] request to return [it]." проха́ння ("request") + infinitive пове́рнути is a polite, impersonal way to ask — gentler than an outright command, and very characteristic of notices ("проха́ння не пали́ти" = "please do not smoke").

On choosing the polite plural and softened forms, see The Imperative: Politeness and Usage; on the ти/ви choice that drives all of this, see Formal vs. Informal Register.

мо́жна отри́мати / не потрі́бна — impersonal possibility and need

Notices love subjectless modal frames. Мо́жна ("one may / it is possible") + infinitive states what is permitted or available without naming who: інформа́цію мо́жна отри́мати = "information can be obtained." Реєстра́ція не потрі́бна ("registration [is] not needed") uses the predicate потрі́бний agreeing with its noun (feminine потрі́бна with feminine реєстра́ція) — the negative makes it "not required." Both are compact, faceless, official.

Glossary

Common Mistakes