Learn Hardcore German: Ich gehe im Garten spazieren, auch wenn es kalt ist. - I go for a walk in the garden, even if it is cold.

In the sentence Ich gehe im Garten spazieren, auch wenn es kalt ist., what does im Garten literally mean, and why is it im and not in dem?

Im Garten literally means in the garden.

Grammatically:

The preposition in is used.
Garten is masculine: der Garten.
In the dative singular, der Garten becomes dem Garten.
in + dem contracts to im in standard German.

So:

in dem Garten → im Garten (completely normal and much more common). There is no form im den; that would be incorrect.

Why is Garten in the dative case (im Garten) and not accusative (in den Garten), even though gehe expresses movement?

With in, German chooses the case based on meaning:

Use dative (wo? = where?) for location:
- Ich gehe im Garten spazieren.
  → I walk in the garden (my walking takes place there).
Use accusative (wohin? = where to?) for direction / into:
- Ich gehe in den Garten.
  → I go into the garden (the movement leads there).

In your sentence, the focus is not on going into the garden, but on walking around within the garden. That’s a location → dative → im Garten.

What exactly is spazieren doing in this sentence? Is it a verb by itself, and why does it come at the end?

Yes, spazieren is a verb (to stroll), but here it appears as part of a fixed expression:

spazieren gehen = to go for a walk / to go walking

In the sentence:

gehe is the conjugated verb (1st person singular of gehen).
spazieren is an infinitive that completes the meaning of gehen.

Word order:

In a main clause, the conjugated verb is in second position: Ich gehe …
Other verb parts (infinitives, participles) go to the end: … spazieren.

So:

Ich gehe im Garten spazieren.
→ subject (Ich) – verb in 2nd position (gehe) – rest of the sentence – verb complement at the end (spazieren).

Could I also say Ich spaziere im Garten instead of Ich gehe im Garten spazieren? If yes, is there any difference in meaning or style?

You can say both:

Ich gehe im Garten spazieren.
Ich spaziere im Garten.

Meaning: In everyday contexts, they both mean I walk / I am taking a walk in the garden.

Nuance:

spazieren gehen is extremely common in spoken German and sounds very natural and neutral.
spazieren as the main verb (Ich spaziere im Garten) is correct, but can sound a bit more written, slightly more formal, or stylistically elevated, depending on context.

In normal conversation, people usually say spazieren gehen.

What does auch wenn mean, and how is it different from just wenn or from obwohl?

auch wenn roughly means even if / even though. It introduces a concession: you do something despite a certain condition.

In your sentence:

auch wenn es kalt ist ≈ even if / even though it is cold

Comparison:

wenn alone:
- Basic meaning: if / when / whenever
- Example: Ich gehe im Garten spazieren, wenn es warm ist.
  → I walk in the garden when it’s warm.
auch wenn:
- Adds the idea of in spite of that or even if.
- Ich gehe im Garten spazieren, auch wenn es kalt ist.
  → I walk in the garden even if / even though it’s cold (the cold doesn’t stop me).
obwohl:
- Means although / even though.
- Stresses a clear contradiction between two facts.
- Ich gehe im Garten spazieren, obwohl es kalt ist.
  → I walk in the garden although it is cold.

Main difference:

obwohl normally refers to a known, real fact.
auch wenn can be:
- factual: even though it is cold (and it actually is), or
- hypothetical: even if it is cold (maybe it will be, maybe not).

In your sentence, auch wenn emphasizes that the cold does not prevent you from walking in the garden.

Why is the verb ist at the end of the clause auch wenn es kalt ist?

Because wenn (and auch wenn) introduces a subordinate clause. In German:

In main clauses, the verb is in second position:
- Es ist kalt.
In subordinate clauses introduced by words like dass, weil, wenn, obwohl, the conjugated verb goes to the end:
- …, weil es kalt ist.
- …, wenn es kalt ist.
- …, auch wenn es kalt ist.

So auch wenn es kalt ist must end with ist:

conjunction (auch wenn) – subject (es) – predicate/complement (kalt) – verb (ist) at the end.

What does es refer to in es kalt ist? Is it talking about the weather?

Here es is a dummy subject, very similar to English it in it is cold.

It doesn’t refer to a specific noun (not the garden or the air explicitly).
It usually refers to the general situation / weather / environment.

German often needs es as a subject in sentences about:

Weather: Es regnet. (It’s raining.)
Temperature: Es ist kalt. (It’s cold.)
Time: Es ist spät. (It’s late.)

So yes, you can think of it as the weather / conditions are cold, but grammatically it’s just the formal subject es.

Why is there a comma before auch wenn in this sentence?

Because auch wenn es kalt ist is a subordinate clause, and in German orthography:

A comma is mandatory between a main clause and a subordinate clause.

Structure of your sentence:

Main clause: Ich gehe im Garten spazieren
Subordinate clause: auch wenn es kalt ist

They must be separated:

Ich gehe im Garten spazieren, auch wenn es kalt ist.

Can I put the auch wenn clause at the beginning, and would the word order change? For example: Auch wenn es kalt ist, gehe ich im Garten spazieren.

Yes, that is perfectly correct, and very natural:

Auch wenn es kalt ist, gehe ich im Garten spazieren.

What changes?

The subordinate clause Auch wenn es kalt ist moves to the front.
In the main clause that follows, the conjugated verb must still be in second position. The whole subordinate clause counts as position 1, so:
- Auch wenn es kalt ist, gehe ich im Garten spazieren.
  Not: Auch wenn es kalt ist, ich gehe im Garten spazieren.

Word order rule:

Something (anything) in first position,
then the conjugated verb in second position,
then the rest of the main clause.

How would I say this sentence in the past or future tense?

You can change both the main clause and the subordinate clause:

1. Conversational past (perfect):

Ich bin im Garten spazieren gegangen, auch wenn es kalt war.
→ I went for a walk in the garden, even though it was cold.

2. Simple past:

Ich ging im Garten spazieren, auch wenn es kalt war.
→ I walked in the garden, even though it was cold.
(Simple past of gehen is common in writing; spoken German prefers the perfect.)

3. Future:

Ich werde im Garten spazieren gehen, auch wenn es kalt ist.
→ I will go for a walk in the garden, even if it is cold.

You could also say:

…, auch wenn es kalt sein wird. (= even if it will be cold)
but …, auch wenn es kalt ist in the future sentence is very normal and often preferred in everyday speech.

How do I form the perfect tense of spazieren gehen? Where do spazieren and gegangen go?

In the perfect tense, spazieren gehen works like other movement verbs with sein:

Auxiliary: sein
Past participle: gegangen
The infinitive spazieren stays next to gegangen at the end.

Examples:

Ich bin im Garten spazieren gegangen.
I went for a walk in the garden.
Wir sind gestern lange am Fluss spazieren gegangen.

Word order:

Conjugated auxiliary in 2nd position (bin, bist, ist, …)
spazieren gegangen as a cluster at the very end of the clause.

Could I leave out auch and just say …, wenn es kalt ist? How would that change the meaning?

Yes, you can say:

Ich gehe im Garten spazieren, wenn es kalt ist.

Difference in meaning:

wenn es kalt ist = when / if it is cold
→ Neutral condition: whenever it is cold, I (then) walk in the garden. No strong sense of “in spite of”.
auch wenn es kalt ist = even if / even though it is cold
→ Concessive: I walk in the garden despite the fact that it is cold. The cold could be a reason not to go, but you go anyway.

So auch adds the “even” idea and makes the sentence more clearly a concession.

Is it possible to use obwohl instead of auch wenn here, and what would be the difference between obwohl es kalt ist and auch wenn es kalt ist?

You can say:

Ich gehe im Garten spazieren, obwohl es kalt ist.

Both obwohl es kalt ist and auch wenn es kalt ist can be translated as although / even though it is cold, but there is a nuance:

obwohl es kalt ist
- Assumes the cold is a fact.
- Stresses a clear contradiction: Normally, cold weather would stop someone from walking, but you do it anyway.
auch wenn es kalt ist
- Can be factual (even though it is cold) or hypothetical (even if it’s cold, whether or not it actually is).
- Emphasizes that the cold does not influence your decision.

In this exact sentence, both are grammatically fine; obwohl sounds slightly stronger in the sense of “in spite of this known fact”, while auch wenn is slightly broader and can sound a bit more conditional.

Why is kalt not capitalized or inflected (for example as kaltes) in es kalt ist?

Because here kalt is a simple adjective used predicatively, not a noun and not placed directly before a noun.

Rules:

Adjectives in predicative position (after sein, werden, bleiben) are:
- not capitalized,
- not inflected (no -e, -es, -en, etc.).
Adjectives used before a noun get endings and stay lowercase:
- ein kalter Tag (a cold day)
- das kalte Wetter (the cold weather)

So:

Es ist kalt. (adjective, predicative)
But: die Kälte (the cold) → here it becomes a noun and is capitalized.