Learn Hardcore Russian: Собака выглядывает из дома.

из
- genitive = from inside something, out of an enclosed space
- из дома – out of the house (from the inside)
- из коробки – out of the box
от
- genitive = (away) from a person / object / source, not necessarily from the inside
- уйти от дома – go away from the house (distance increases)
- письмо от друга – a letter from a friend
с(о)
- genitive = from the surface / from on top of something
- с стола / со стола – off the table
- с крыши – from the roof

In Собака выглядывает из дома, the dog is looking out from inside the house, so из is the natural choice.

What exactly does выглядывает mean? How is it different from just смотрит (looks)?

Both involve looking, but they are not interchangeable:

смотреть = to look, watch, direct your eyes at something
- Neutral verb of looking
- Says nothing about where you are looking from
выглядывать = to look/peek out from behind or from inside something
- Has the prefix вы-, which often means out (from inside to outside)
- Implies part of the subject appears from behind an obstacle or from inside a space

So:

Собака смотрит. – The dog is looking. (Just looking at something.)
Собака выглядывает из дома. – The dog is poking its head out and looking from inside the house to the outside (peeking out).

Is выглядывает present tense? How would I say “peeks out / will peek out” as a single, completed action?

Yes, выглядывает is present tense, imperfective aspect:

(она) выглядывает – she (the dog) is peeking / peeks (in general, or a process).

The corresponding perfective verb is выглянуть:

(она) выглянет – she will peek out (one completed act in the future)
(она) выглянула – she peeked out (one completed act in the past)

Russian:

imperfective present = both “peeks” and “is peeking” in English
perfective has no present; its “present forms” refer to the future.

So:

Собака выглядывает из дома. – The dog is peeking out of the house.
Собака выглянет из дома. – The dog will peek out of the house (once / at some point).

Why is it выглядывает, not выглядит? Don’t both start with вы-?

They are different verbs that look similar but have different meanings:

выглядеть = to look, to appear (seem)
- Она выглядит усталой. – She looks tired. (appears tired)
выглядывать = to look out / peek out (from somewhere)
- Собака выглядывает из дома. – The dog is peeking out of the house.

So:

Собака выглядит из дома – incorrect and nonsensical.
Собака выглядит усталой. – The dog looks tired.
Собака выглядывает из дома. – The dog is poking its head out of the house.

Why is собака in that form? What case is it?

Собака is in the nominative case, which is the dictionary form and is used for the subject of the sentence.

The subject is the thing that does the action of the verb. Here:

Who is doing the action of выглядывает (is peeking out)?
→ Собака (the dog)

Therefore, собака is nominative singular, feminine.

Basic singular forms of собака:

Nominative: собака (a/the dog) – subject
Genitive: собаки (of a dog)
Dative: собаке
Accusative: собаку
Instrumental: собакой
Prepositional: о собаке

Is собака always feminine? What if the dog is male?

Grammatically, собака is feminine, because it ends in -а and declines like a feminine noun. So verbs and adjectives will agree with it in the feminine:

Собака выглядывает из дома. – verb in 3rd person singular (gender-neutral form)
Моя собака маленькая. – adjective маленькая is feminine.

Biologically, the dog might be male, but grammar still treats собака as feminine.
If you want to emphasize that the dog is male, you can say:

кобель – male dog
- Кобель выглядывает из дома. – The male dog is peeking out of the house.

However, in everyday speech, people often just say собака even for male dogs.

Why don’t we need a word for “is” in “The dog is peeking out of the house”?

Russian does not normally use a present-tense form of “to be” (быть) in such sentences.

In English:

The dog is peeking out of the house.

In Russian:

Собака выглядывает из дома.
(literally: Dog peeks-out from house)

The present tense meaning “is doing” is already expressed by the conjugated verb выглядывает (3rd person singular, present). You do not add есть or any other form of быть here.

You only see быть in:

Past/future tenses
Certain emphatic or special constructions

Does выглядывает mean “is peeking (right now)” or “peeks (generally)”? How do I show continuous action?

Russian present imperfective covers both meanings:

Собака выглядывает из дома. can mean:
- The dog is peeking out of the house (right now, ongoing action), or
- The dog (often) peeks out of the house (habitually).

Context clarifies which is meant. Russian does not have a separate grammar form for “present continuous” like English is doing. Instead:

Imperfective present = does / is doing / does regularly
Perfective future = will do (once, as a complete action)

Can I change the word order, like Из дома выглядывает собака? Does it change the meaning?

Yes, you can say:

Собака выглядывает из дома. (neutral word order)
Из дома выглядывает собака.

The basic meaning is the same, but the focus shifts a little:

Собака выглядывает из дома.
- Neutral; just stating what the dog does and from where.
Из дома выглядывает собака.
- Slightly more emphasis on из дома (from the house), or on the fact that it is a dog (and not something else) appearing from the house.
- Can sound a bit more descriptive, like you’re painting a scene:
  “From the house, a dog is peeking out.”

Russian word order is flexible because case endings show who does what, but moving words around can change the information focus and style.

What is the difference between из дома and из дома на улицу?

из дома – simply from (inside) the house / out of the house
- Focus on leaving or looking out of the house.
из дома на улицу – from the house to the street / outside (to the street)
- Adds the destination на улицу (to the street), showing the direction of motion all the way to outside.

In Собака выглядывает из дома, the dog is still in the house, just peeking out.
If you said:

Собака выбегает из дома на улицу. – The dog is running out of the house into the street.

Here the dog is clearly going from inside to outside as a full movement.

Could I leave out из дома and just say Собака выглядывает?

Grammatically, yes:

Собака выглядывает.

This would just mean “The dog is peeking (out)”, but it would be less specific. The verb выглядывать strongly suggests “out from behind/inside something,” so listeners will expect you to say from where:

Собака выглядывает из дома. – out of the house
Собака выглядывает из-за занавески. – from behind the curtain
Собака выглядывает из-за угла. – from around the corner

Without the из / из-за / из-под + noun, the sentence feels incomplete unless the context already made the location obvious.

Is дома here the same as дома meaning “at home”?

They look the same in writing, but function differently depending on context:

Genitive singular of дом (of the house / from the house)
- After из, it is clearly a noun in the genitive:
  - из дома – from/out of the house
Adverb “at home”
- Я дома. – I am at home.
- Here дома is not a case form used with a preposition; it’s an adverb indicating location.

In Собака выглядывает из дома, дома is the genitive singular of дом governed by из, not the adverb “at home.”

How do you pronounce Собака выглядывает из дома and where are the stresses?

Stresses (marked with capitals here):

Собака выглядывает из дома

More precisely (with stress marks):

соба́ка
выгля́дывает
из до́ма

Pronunciation tips:

со = [sa]
ба́ = [BA]
ка = [ka] → собáка: sa-BA-ka
вы = [vy] (like “vi” in “village”, but with Russian ы)
гля́ = [glyA] (soft гл
- stressed я)
ды = [dy]
ва = [va]
ет = [yet] → выгля́дывает: vy-GLYA-dy-va-yet
из = [ees]
до́ = [DO]
ма = [ma] → до́ма: DO-ma

Spoken together:
са-BA-ka vy-GLYA-dy-va-yet iz DO-ma

Could I use another preposition instead of из, like из-за or с? How would that change the meaning?

Yes, different prepositions would change the picture:

из дома – from inside the house
- Собака выглядывает из дома. – The dog is peeking out of the house (from inside).
из-за дома – from behind the house (spatially behind it)
- Собака выглядывает из-за дома. – The dog is peeking out from behind the house (the house is between the dog and the observer).
с дома – “off the house” (from its surface/roof; very unusual here unless you specify крыши)
- С крыши дома выглядывает собака. – A dog is peeking from the roof of the house.

Each preposition + case combination encodes a different spatial relationship. In the original sentence, из дома is the natural choice because the dog is inside and poking its head out.