Learn Hardcore Finnish: Verenpaine on liian korkea tänään.

Verenpaine on liian korkea tänään can mean “The blood pressure is too high today”, “My blood pressure is too high today”, or even “Blood pressure is too high today”, depending on context.
The definiteness (the / a / my) is understood from the situation, not from a specific word like in English.

What exactly does verenpaine consist of? Why verenpaine and not veripaine?

Verenpaine is a compound word made of two parts:

veren = genitive form of veri (blood) → “of blood”
paine = pressure

So literally verenpaine is “pressure of blood”, i.e. blood pressure.

You might expect veripaine (blood + pressure with no case ending), but Finnish often forms compounds with the genitive of the first noun, especially in medical or technical terms. So verenpaine is the fixed, correct form.

Why is it verenpaine on and not something like olen verenpaine if I mean “my blood pressure is too high”?

The subject of the sentence is verenpaine (blood pressure), not I.

on is the 3rd person singular of olla (to be), used with he/she/it or any 3rd-person noun.
In Finnish you say literally “Blood pressure is too high today”, and it is understood you are talking about your own blood pressure.

If you want to make possession explicit, you can say:

Minun verenpaineeni on liian korkea tänään. = My blood pressure is too high today.
In everyday speech, people often say: Mun verenpaine on liian korkea tänään.

Does the verb on change depending on who the blood pressure belongs to?

No. On is always the 3rd person singular form of olla (to be) and it does not change according to who owns the thing:

Verenpaine on liian korkea. – The / (my) blood pressure is too high.
Hänen verenpaineensa on liian korkea. – His/her blood pressure is too high.

The verb stays on as long as the grammatical subject (verenpaine) is 3rd person singular. What changes is the possessor (minun, hänen, etc.), not the verb.

Why is it liian korkea and not liikaa korkea or liian korkeaa?

There are three separate issues here:

liian vs liikaa
- liian = too (something) and is used before an adjective or adverb:
  - liian korkea = too high
  - liian kallis = too expensive
- liikaa = too much (as a separate amount):
  - Hän juo liikaa. = He drinks too much.
So with an adjective (korkea), you want liian, not liikaa.
Why korkea and not korkeaa
- korkea is the nominative singular form of the adjective.
- It agrees in case and number with its noun verenpaine, which is also nominative singular.
- You would use korkeaa (partitive) in different structures, for example:
  - Verenpaine on liian korkeaa is not idiomatic; instead you say liian korkea.

So in this structure [subject] + on + liian + adjective, you use nominative: liian korkea.

Where does tänään usually go in the sentence? Can I move it?

Yes, tänään (today) is flexible in word order. All of these are possible:

Verenpaine on liian korkea tänään.
Tänään verenpaine on liian korkea.
Verenpaine tänään on liian korkea. (less common, more contrastive)

The neutral, everyday choice is usually one of the first two. Putting tänään at the very start can emphasize “today (as opposed to other days)”.

How would I say “My blood pressure was too high yesterday” instead?

You mainly change on to the past tense oli, and tänään to eilen:

Verenpaine oli liian korkea eilen.
= My / the blood pressure was too high yesterday.

With explicit possession:

Minun verenpaineeni oli liian korkea eilen.
Colloquial: Mun verenpaine oli liian korkea eilen.

How do I make this sentence negative: “My blood pressure is not too high today”?

Finnish negatives use the verb ei plus the main verb in a special form.

Verenpaine ei ole liian korkea tänään.
= The / my blood pressure is not too high today.

Structure:

ei = negative verb (3rd person singular stays ei)
ole = basic form of olla used after ei
everything else is the same: verenpaine … liian korkea tänään

How would I say clearly “My blood pressure is too high today” if I want to stress that it’s mine?

You have a few options, from formal to very spoken:

Minun verenpaineeni on liian korkea tänään.
- Very clear and somewhat formal (possessive suffix -ni on verenpaine).
Mun verenpaine on liian korkea tänään.
- Common spoken Finnish (no possessive suffix, spoken mun instead of minun).
Mulla on tänään liian korkea verenpaine.
- Very natural spoken style using the “minulla on” possession structure:
- Literally: “On me there is too high blood pressure today.”

Is verenpaine always singular, or can it be plural?

You will see both singular and plural in practice:

Singular:
- Verenpaine on liian korkea. – Blood pressure is too high.
- Neutral and perfectly correct.
Plural:
- Verenpaineet ovat liian korkeat. – (The) blood pressures are too high.

In everyday speech and medical contexts, plural verenpaineet is also common, because blood pressure is often thought of as having two numbers (systolic and diastolic). For a beginner, using the singular is safest and always correct.

How do I pronounce verenpaine and tänään?

Basic pronunciation tips:

verenpaine
- Syllables: ve-ren-pai-ne
- Stress is always on the first syllable: VE-ren-pai-ne
- ai is like “eye” in English “eye”.
tänään
- Syllables: tä-nään
- Stress on the first syllable: TÄ-nään
- The double ä (ää) is a long vowel: hold it about twice as long as a single vowel.

Length matters in Finnish: tänä and tänään are different words, so try to make the ää clearly long.

Why is veren ending in -n? What case is that?

Veren is the genitive singular of veri (blood):

veri (nominative) → veren (genitive)

The genitive (ending -n) often expresses “of X”, and it is very common as the first part of compound words:

verenpaine = pressure of blood → blood pressure
auton ovi = door of the car → car door
ihmisen keho = body of a human → human body

In compound nouns like verenpaine, the genitive form (veren) is written together with the second noun as one word.

Could I say Korkea verenpaine on tänään instead? It feels closer to English word order.

You can say Korkea verenpaine on tänään, but it sounds incomplete, like:

“High blood pressure is today …” (and you’re about to add more information).

The natural complete pattern is:

Verenpaine on liian korkea tänään. – Blood pressure is too high today.
Or, if you want to emphasize the property: Verenpaine on tänään korkea. – Blood pressure is high today.

In Finnish, the typical order is:

[subject] + on + [adjective phrase] + [time word]

so Verenpaine on liian korkea tänään is the most straightforward version.