Ég vona að vináttan okkar verði varanleg.

A fairly literal breakdown is:

• Ég = I
• vona = hope
• að = that
• vináttan = the friendship
• okkar = our / of us
• verði = be / become in the subjunctive
• varanleg = lasting, enduring, permanent

So the sentence is literally something like:

I hope that the friendship of ours become/be lasting.

In natural English, that becomes I hope our friendship will last or I hope our friendship will be lasting/enduring.

Að introduces a subordinate clause, like English that.

So:

• Ég vona = I hope
• að vináttan okkar verði varanleg = that our friendship will be lasting

In English, that is often optional: I hope (that) our friendship will last.
In Icelandic, að is normally kept.

Vináttan is the definite form of vinátta.

• vinátta = friendship
• vináttan = the friendship

Icelandic often uses the definite form when a noun is followed by a possessive like okkar:

• vináttan okkar = our friendship

That may feel strange to an English speaker, because English does not say the our friendship, but this is a normal Icelandic pattern.

In Icelandic, possessive expressions are often placed after the noun:

• vináttan okkar = our friendship

This is very natural and common.

Okkar is historically a genitive form meaning of us, and in this kind of phrase it works as our.

You can also find other arrangements, but vináttan okkar is the most neutral everyday wording here.

Because verði is the subjunctive form of verða.

After a verb like vona (to hope), Icelandic very often uses the subjunctive in the following clause, because the speaker is expressing:

• a hope
• a wish
• something uncertain
• something not yet established as fact

So:

• verður = indicative, more like a straightforward statement/prediction
• verði = subjunctive, appropriate for I hope that...

This is one of the most important things to notice in the sentence.

This is a very good question.

• vera = to be
• verða = to become, to turn out, sometimes to be in a future/result sense

So verði varanleg is literally closer to become lasting or turn out to be lasting.

That fits the meaning well: the speaker hopes the friendship will develop into something enduring.

If you used vera instead, the meaning would shift more toward I hope our friendship is lasting—more about its current state than about what it will prove to be.

Right—Icelandic often does not need a separate future tense marker like English will.

Future meaning can come from:

• context
• the type of verb
• the overall situation
• sometimes other helping verbs

Here, the idea of the future is understood from the whole sentence:

• Ég vona... already points forward
• verði expresses a hoped-for result, not a present fact

So Icelandic says Ég vona að vináttan okkar verði varanleg, where English naturally says I hope our friendship will be lasting / will last.

Because this is an adjective, not an adverb.

After verða (and also after vera), Icelandic uses a predicate adjective that agrees with the subject:

• vináttan is feminine singular
• so the adjective is varanleg (feminine singular form)

Compare:

• varanlegur = masculine
• varanleg = feminine
• varanlegt = neuter

Varanlega would be an adverb, meaning something like permanently or in a lasting way, and that is not what the sentence needs.

Varanleg means lasting, enduring, or permanent.

For a friendship, lasting or enduring is often the best natural sense.
Permanent is possible, but in English it can sound a little stronger or more absolute.

So the sentence has a warm, slightly formal tone—more than just I hope we stay friends for a while. It suggests a hope for something deep and long-term.

Yes, you may see or hear alternatives such as okkar vinátta, but vináttan okkar is the most neutral and natural phrasing here.

Very roughly:

• vináttan okkar = ordinary, natural our friendship
• okkar vinátta = possible, but can sound more literary, emphatic, or stylistically marked

So for a learner, vináttan okkar is the safest pattern to remember.