Der Kaffee macht mich wach.

The coffee makes me awake.

Breakdown of Der Kaffee macht mich wach.

• machen: to make
• wach: awake
• der Kaffee: the coffee
• mich: me

Questions & Answers about Der Kaffee macht mich wach.

Why do we use macht mich wach instead of something like macht mich wachen?

In German, wach is an adjective meaning "awake." Here it functions as a complement describing the direct object mich. German doesn’t use wachen in this context; wachen is a verb meaning "to keep watch" or "stay awake," which doesn’t fit the structure of "to make somebody awake."

Why is mich in the accusative case rather than mir?

In this sentence, der Kaffee (the coffee) is the subject, so the person being made awake is the direct object. Therefore, we use the accusative pronoun mich instead of the dative pronoun mir, which would indicate an indirect object.

Could I say Der Kaffee macht mich auf instead?

It would sound unnatural in German. While aufmachen means "to open" in certain contexts, mich aufmachen doesn’t convey the sense of "making me awake." The set phrase is wach machen.

What is the basic word order here?

In German, the typical word order is Subject – Verb – Object – Other elements. So we have Der Kaffee (subject) macht (verb) mich (object) wach (adjective complement). This is a straightforward S-V-O word order with an additional adjective at the end.