Breakdown of Sind alle Tickets ausverkauft?
sein
to be
alle
all, everyone
das Ticket
the ticket
ausverkaufen
to sell out
Questions & Answers about Sind alle Tickets ausverkauft?
The verb here is formed with sind and the past participle ausverkauft. Since verkaufen normally takes haben in the past tense, what is going on here?
This is the stative passive (Zustandspassiv). If this were the regular conversational past (Perfekt) describing the action of selling, it would use haben (for example, Sie haben die Tickets ausverkauft). By using sein (sind) instead, the sentence describes the resulting state: the selling is over, and the tickets are currently in a sold-out state.
I know past participles usually start with ge- or have -ge- in the middle for separable verbs. Why is there no -ge- in ausverkauft?
Ausverkaufen is a separable verb made of aus + verkaufen. Normally, the -ge- goes between the prefix and the verb (like eingekauft). However, verbs starting with the inseparable prefix ver- never take a -ge-. Because verkaufen becomes verkauft, adding the separable prefix aus- just gives you ausverkauft.
If ausverkauft is acting to describe a state, why doesn't it have a plural ending like ausverkaufte to match alle Tickets?
In German, adjectives and participles only take endings when they come directly before the noun they describe (like die ausverkauften Tickets). When they come after the noun with a linking verb like sein (as in this stative passive construction), they never take an ending and keep their base form.
Is Tickets a standard German plural form?
Das Ticket is a loanword from English. Many modern loanwords take an -s to form the plural in German, unlike traditional German nouns which usually use endings like -e, -er, -n, or an umlaut.
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