Question 1

Why is there no article “the” or “a” in Kahvi on ilmainen tänään?

Accepted Answer

Finnish does not use definite or indefinite articles. Instead of “a/an” or “the,” you simply state the noun in its base (nominative) form. Context tells you whether you mean “coffee in general” or “the coffee we were talking about.”

Question 2

What case is kahvi in, and why?

Accepted Answer

kahvi (“coffee”) is in the nominative case, which is the form you use for the subject of a sentence. Since “coffee” is the thing that “is free,” it stays in nominative.

Question 3

What about ilmainen—is it a noun or an adjective, and what form is it?

Accepted Answer

ilmainen is an adjective meaning “free (of charge).” Here it’s the predicate adjective, describing the subject kahvi, and so it’s also in the nominative singular. Finnish predicate adjectives agree in case (nominative) and number (singular) with their subjects.

Question 4

Why doesn’t tänään have any case ending?

Accepted Answer

tänään (“today”) is an adverb of time. Adverbs in Finnish are typically uninflected—they don’t take case endings—so the base form tells you “when” something happens.

Question 5

Can I move tänään to the front? For example, Tänään kahvi on ilmainen?

Accepted Answer

Yes. Finnish has fairly free word order for emphasis. Placing tänään at the beginning emphasizes “today.” The basic meaning doesn’t change.

Question 6

How do I pronounce ilmainen tänään?

Accepted Answer

– Stress always goes on the first syllable of each Finnish word: IL-main-en TÄÄ-nään.  
– “ai” in ilmainen sounds like the “i” in English “fine.”  
– “ää” in tänään is a long “a,” held about twice as long as a short vowel.

Question 7

What’s the difference between ilmainen and ilmaista?

Accepted Answer

– ilmainen is the nominative adjective: “(something) is free.”  
– ilmaista is the partitive stem, used when you say “free coffee” as an object, e.g. Meillä on ilmaista kahvia tänään (“We have free coffee today”). The partitive adjective agrees with the partitive noun kahvia.

Question 8

Do I always need the verb on? Can it ever be dropped?

Accepted Answer

In standard Finnish, the present-tense copula on (“is”) is required: Kahvi on ilmainen. You don’t drop it the way you might in colloquial English (“Coffee free today?”). For questions you invert it: Onko kahvi ilmainen tänään?

Question 9

What if I want to talk about multiple cups? Can I say “coffees are free today”?

Accepted Answer

Yes, but you must pluralize both noun and adjective:  
Kahvit ovat ilmaisia tänään.  
Here kahvit is plural nominative, ovat is the 3rd-person plural of olla, and ilmaisia is the plural nominative form of the adjective.

Kahvi on ilmainen tänään.

Breakdown of Kahvi on ilmainen tänään.

Questions & Answers about Kahvi on ilmainen tänään.

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Master Finnish — from Kahvi on ilmainen tänään to fluency