Tehtävä on yksinkertainen.

The task is simple.

Breakdown of Tehtävä on yksinkertainen.

• olla: to be
• tehtävä: the task
• yksinkertainen: simple

Questions & Answers about Tehtävä on yksinkertainen.

What does tehtävä mean exactly, and is it related to any verb?

Tehtävä is a noun meaning roughly “task / exercise / assignment / job to be done.”

It is directly related to the verb tehdä (“to do, to make”).
Grammatically, tehtävä is originally a participle form meaning “(something) that must / is to be done”, and from that it has become a common noun meaning a task or exercise.

In this sentence, Tehtävä is a noun in the nominative singular, used as the subject: “The task …”

Why is there no word for “a” or “the” in Tehtävä on yksinkertainen?

Finnish has no articles like English “a/an” or “the.”

Whether you understand tehtävä as “a task” or “the task” comes from context, not from any separate word.

So Tehtävä on yksinkertainen can be translated as:

• “The task is simple.”
• “A task is simple.” (in a more generic statement)

but the Finnish sentence itself does not mark that distinction.

What form is on, and what verb does it come from?

On is the 3rd person singular present tense form of the verb olla (“to be”).

The basic conjugation is:

• minä olen – I am
• sinä olet – you (sg) are
• hän / se on – he / she / it is
• me olemme – we are
• te olette – you (pl) are
• he / ne ovat – they are

So in Tehtävä on yksinkertainen, on corresponds to English “is.”

Why is yksinkertainen in that exact form? Why not something like yksinkertaista?

Yksinkertainen is an adjective in the nominative singular.
In sentences with olla (“to be”), a basic rule is:

• The subject (here: Tehtävä) is in nominative.
• The adjective describing it (the predicative) is also in nominative, agreeing in number and (where relevant) case.

So:

• Tehtävä on yksinkertainen. – The task is simple.

The partitive form yksinkertaista can appear in other structures, for example:

• Se on vähän yksinkertaista. – That’s a bit simple / simplistic.
• On yksinkertaista ymmärtää tämä. – It is simple to understand this.

But with a straight “X is Y” description of a whole countable thing, nominative (yksinkertainen) is the normal form.

What grammatical case is tehtävä in here?

Here tehtävä is in the nominative singular case.

That is the dictionary form of the noun, and it is used for:

• Subjects of sentences
• “Bare” citation forms (as you’d see in a vocabulary list)

So in Tehtävä on yksinkertainen, Tehtävä = nominative subject: “(The) task”.

If I want to say “The tasks are simple”, how do I change the sentence?

You need to put both the noun and the adjective into the plural:

• Tehtävät ovat yksinkertaisia.
  Literally: “Tasks are simple (ones).”

Here:

• Tehtävät – plural nominative of tehtävä (subject)
• ovat – 3rd person plural of olla
• yksinkertaisia – plural partitive of yksinkertainen, commonly used for describing plural subjects like this.

You can also see Tehtävät ovat yksinkertaiset, with plural nominative yksinkertaiset, but Tehtävät ovat yksinkertaisia is more typical in everyday language.

Can I change the word order, like Yksinkertainen on tehtävä?

You can change the word order, but it usually changes the focus and sometimes sounds odd.

• Tehtävä on yksinkertainen. – Neutral, natural: The task is simple.

• Yksinkertainen tehtävä on. – Feels incomplete or poetic, like you’re starting a longer sentence.

• Yksinkertainen on tehtävä. – Possible in a poetic or emphatic context; it sounds as if you are saying “Simple is the task.”

For normal everyday Finnish, Tehtävä on yksinkertainen is the standard word order.

How do you pronounce Tehtävä on yksinkertainen?

Approximate pronunciation (with English-like hints):

• Tehtävä: TEH-htä-vä

  • t always hard, like in top
  • eh like in bed
  • ä like the a in cat (but a bit tenser)
  • Double ht means a clearly strong / longer stop, not exactly two consonants separately, but a strong t-like closing.

• on: on (like English on, but shorter and cleaner)

• yksinkertainen: OOK-sin-kair-te-nen (approximation)

  • y is like the French u in lune, or German ü in für
  • ksi is like k-si
  • ai as in English eye
  • Stress is always on the first syllable of each word:
    
    • TEHtävä on YKsinkertainen.

Finnish vowels are short and pure, and each written vowel and consonant is pronounced.

Is there any difference between yksinkertainen and helppo?

Yes, they are related but not identical:

• yksinkertainen – simple in structure; not complicated.
  
  • Can sometimes mean “simple-minded” about a person (slightly negative).
• helppo – easy to do; not difficult.

So:

• Tehtävä on yksinkertainen. – The task is simple (not complex).
• Tehtävä on helppo. – The task is easy (not hard to perform).

Often a simple task is also easy, but in some contexts something can be structurally simple yet still not easy in practice.

How would I say “Your task is simple”?

You normally add a possessive suffix to tehtävä:

• Tehtäväsi on yksinkertainen. – Your task is simple.

Here:

• tehtävä – task
• -si – your (2nd person singular possessive suffix)
• on – is
• yksinkertainen – simple

You can optionally add the pronoun sinun for emphasis:

• Sinun tehtäväsi on yksinkertainen. – “Your task is simple.” (more emphatic / contrastive)

Can you drop on and just say Tehtävä yksinkertainen?

In standard written Finnish, you do not normally drop on here. The correct full sentence is:

• Tehtävä on yksinkertainen.

In very colloquial spoken Finnish, people sometimes omit forms of olla, but that depends heavily on dialect and context, and Tehtävä on yksinkertainen with on included is the form you should learn and use.

Is tehtävä an adjective or a noun here?

In this sentence, tehtävä is a noun meaning “task / exercise.”

Historically and morphologically, tehtävä is also a participle (something like “(to be) done”), so it can appear in constructions that feel more verbal, for example:

• Tehtävä työ – “the work that must be done.”

But in Tehtävä on yksinkertainen, it functions clearly as a noun, the subject of the sentence.