Breakdown of Sovellus näyttää eräpäivän selvästi.
Questions & Answers about Sovellus näyttää eräpäivän selvästi.
It’s -n because the word is a total object in the sentence: the app shows the due date (a complete, bounded thing). In Finnish, a singular total object is typically marked with the genitive-looking -n (often called “genitive object” in older grammar, but functionally it’s the accusative for most nouns).
So eräpäivä → eräpäivän.
You’d use the partitive (eräpäivää) when the object is unbounded, partial, ongoing, or negated, for example:
- Sovellus näyttää eräpäivää. = it’s showing the due date (e.g., in progress / not framed as a complete result)
- Sovellus ei näytä eräpäivää. = the app does not show the due date (negation forces partitive)
In your sentence (affirmative + “clearly” implying a clear result), eräpäivän fits best.
Sovellus is the subject and it’s in the nominative singular, which often has no visible ending in Finnish. It’s just the basic dictionary form: sovellus = “an/the app”.
Näyttää is the 3rd person singular present tense, agreeing with the subject sovellus (singular).
Infinitive: näyttää = “to show”
Present 3rd singular: (se) näyttää = “it shows”
Näyttää has two very common uses: 1) to show/display (something) — transitive, takes an object
- Sovellus näyttää eräpäivän. = The app shows the due date. 2) to seem/appear (to be) — often followed by an adjective or clause
- Se näyttää hyvältä. = It looks good.
In your sentence, the direct object eräpäivän makes it clearly the “display/show” meaning.
Selvästi is an adverb meaning “clearly”. It’s formed from the adjective selvä (“clear”) + the adverb-forming ending -sti:
selvä → selvästi
Finnish word order is fairly flexible, and moving words often changes emphasis rather than basic meaning. Common alternatives include:
- Sovellus näyttää eräpäivän selvästi. (neutral)
- Sovellus näyttää selvästi eräpäivän. (emphasis: it shows it clearly)
- Eräpäivän sovellus näyttää selvästi. (marked/emphatic; sounds like focusing on “the due date” as topic)
Your original order is very natural.
Finnish doesn’t have articles (a/an/the). Definiteness is usually understood from context.
So Sovellus can mean “an app” or “the app”, and eräpäivän can mean “a due date” or “the due date”, depending on the situation.
Yes: eräpäivä is a compound (roughly “due + day”). In Finnish compounds, the last part carries the case ending:
- nominative: eräpäivä
- genitive/total object singular: eräpäivän
- partitive: eräpäivää Only the final element changes; the whole compound inflects as one word.
A few common pitfalls:
- näyttää: tt is long (hold it), and final ää is a long vowel: roughly næyt-tæː
- ä is a front vowel (like the vowel in cat for many speakers, but Finnish is purer/shorter)
- Stress is usually on the first syllable: SÓ-vellus NÄYT-tää E-rä-päi-vän SÉL-väs-ti (stress pattern, not exact English sounds)