Learn Hardcore Polish: Może jutro pogoda się poprawi. - Maybe tomorrow the weather will improve.

There is no infinitive verb after it. For “he can,” you’d expect something like:
- On może poprawić pogodę. – He can improve the weather.
The structure Może + [time] + [clause] is a very common pattern for “maybe”:
- Może jutro pogoda się poprawi. – Maybe tomorrow the weather will improve.

So here, treat może as the adverb “maybe.”

Where is the word “will” in this sentence? Why is there no separate future auxiliary?

Polish often doesn’t need a separate word for “will.” The future can be built into the verb form itself.

poprawi is the simple future of a perfective verb (poprawić – “to improve”).
So poprawi on its own already means “will improve.”

In English you need will improve, two words. In Polish, a perfective verb in the future is usually one word:

(Ona) napisze. – She will write.
Pogoda się poprawi. – The weather will improve.

Why is it poprawi and not poprawia?

This is an aspect difference:

poprawić (perfective) → poprawi (future: “will improve” as a completed change)
poprawiać (imperfective) → poprawia (present: “is improving / improves”)

In the sentence we’re talking about a future change that will be completed:

Może jutro pogoda się poprawi.
Maybe tomorrow the weather will (at some point) get better.

If you said:

Pogoda się poprawia. – The weather is improving / improves (now, or as a general tendency).

So poprawi matches the idea of a single future improvement, not an ongoing process.

What is the purpose of się in pogoda się poprawi?

się is a reflexive particle. Here it makes poprawić reflexive: poprawić się – “to improve (get better).”

poprawić coś – to improve something (transitive)
- Lekarz poprawił receptę. – The doctor corrected the prescription.
poprawić się – to improve (by itself) / “to get better” (intransitive)
- Pogoda się poprawi. – The weather will get better.

English usually doesn’t mark this with a separate word, but Polish uses się to show that the subject (the weather) is what is changing, not improving some other object.

Can I just say Może jutro pogoda poprawi without się?

No, that would sound wrong in standard Polish.

Without się, poprawi needs a direct object – something that is being improved:

Poprawi zadanie. – He will correct the exercise.

Since pogoda is the thing that is changing itself, you need the reflexive:

Pogoda się poprawi. – The weather will improve (get better).

So się is obligatory here.

What case is pogoda in, and how can I tell?

Pogoda is in the nominative singular.

You can tell because:

It’s the subject of the sentence:
- Who/what will improve? → the weather.
For a basic noun like pogoda, the dictionary form and the nominative singular form are the same:
- pogoda – weather (nominative singular).

Objects would usually be in accusative (or other cases), but here pogoda is simply the subject doing the “getting better.”

Why is there no word like “the” or “a” before pogoda?

Polish does not have articles (no equivalents of “a/an/the”).

The noun pogoda can mean:

weather, the weather, or even a certain weather, depending on context.

Context and word order do the job that articles do in English. Here pogoda is just “the weather” from the context:

Może jutro pogoda się poprawi. – Maybe tomorrow (the) weather will improve.

Why is the word order pogoda się poprawi and not się pogoda poprawi or poprawi się pogoda?

Polish word order is flexible, but there are strong tendencies:

się is a clitic and normally appears after the first stressed element of the verb phrase or close to the verb:
- pogoda się poprawi – very natural.
- pogoda poprawi się – also possible, but less neutral here.

Poprawi się pogoda is also grammatically possible, but the word order slightly changes the focus:

Pogoda się poprawi. – neutral statement: “The weather will improve.”
Poprawi się pogoda. – can sound like a slight emphasis on “it’s the weather that will improve” (as opposed to something else).

In everyday speech, pogoda się poprawi is the most neutral and common order.

Can I move the words around, for example: Może pogoda się jutro poprawi or Jutro może pogoda się poprawi?

Yes, these variants are grammatically correct and sound natural, with small differences in emphasis:

Może jutro pogoda się poprawi.
Neutral starting point; maybe
- tomorrow as a frame.
Może pogoda się jutro poprawi.
Slight extra focus on pogoda (“maybe the weather will improve tomorrow,” as opposed to something else changing).
Jutro może pogoda się poprawi.
Emphasizes jutro (“Tomorrow, maybe the weather will improve”).

All keep the same basic meaning. Intonation in speech will further shape what feels emphasized.

Why is it jutro on its own and not something like w jutro?

Jutro is an adverb of time meaning “tomorrow.” As an adverb, it doesn’t need a preposition:

jutro – tomorrow
wczoraj – yesterday
dzisiaj / dziś – today

You only use a preposition with jutro when you turn it into a noun phrase with a different meaning, e.g.:

do jutra – until tomorrow
na jutro – for tomorrow (e.g. homework for tomorrow)

In our sentence it simply answers “when?”, so no preposition is needed:

(Kiedy?) Jutro pogoda się poprawi.

Is there any difference between Może jutro pogoda się poprawi and Może jutro będzie lepsza pogoda?

Both can translate as “Maybe tomorrow the weather will be better,” but there is a nuance:

Może jutro pogoda się poprawi.
Literally: “Maybe tomorrow the weather will improve.”
Focus on the process/change: it will get better.
Może jutro będzie lepsza pogoda.
Literally: “Maybe tomorrow there will be better weather.”
Focus more on the resulting state: the weather will be better tomorrow.

In practice, they’re very close in meaning and equally natural; it’s just a slightly different way to express the same idea.

How is może pronounced, and is it stressed?

może is pronounced approximately as:

[MO-zhe] (IPA: [ˈmɔ.ʐɛ])

Details:

mo- like “mo” in “more,” but shorter and with a slightly more open o.
-że like French “je” or English “zh”
- “e”.

In this sentence, może usually carries a normal sentence stress, since it introduces the whole clause (“maybe”), but intonation will often rise slightly at the end of the sentence to reflect uncertainty: Może jutro pogoda się poprawi ↗ (rising or level–rising tone).

Could może here ever be understood as “he/she can”?

In this exact sentence, no. Context and grammar make that interpretation very unlikely:

For może = “he/she can,” we normally need an infinitive right after it:
- On może poprawić pogodę. – He can improve the weather.
In Może jutro pogoda się poprawi, może is followed by an adverb (jutro) and a full clause; there is no infinitive.

So native speakers will automatically understand może here as “maybe / perhaps,” not as “he/she can.”