Habits and occurrences (бывать)

Describing occurrences

To describe a situation as an "occurrence" or "phenomenon," use явление.

The habitual verb бывать

The verb бывать translates to "to happen," "to occur," or "to tend to be." It is a regular first-conjugation verb related to быть (to be), but focuses on things that happen regularly or repeatedly.

PronounForm
Ябываю
Тыбываешь
Он / Она / Онобывает
Мыбываем
Выбываете
Онибывают
Things happen in different ways, but a miracle won't occur.
Бывает по-разному, но чудо не случится.

Visiting a place regularly

When applied to people and places, бывать means "to visit frequently" or "to spend time."

We have no time to frequent bars.
Нам некогда бывать в барах.

Recurring conditions and states

You can also use бывать to describe weather, moods, or situations that "tend to be" a certain way.

The weather tends to be wonderful in spring.
Весной бывает прекрасная погода.

The negative form не бывает

To say that something never or rarely happens, or that a place tends not to have something, use не бывает. Like нет (there is no), this negative phrase requires the following noun to be in the genitive case. For example, to say there tend to be no queues, use the genitive plural очередей.

This is an ordinary bar where there tend to be no queues.
Это обычный бар, в котором не бывает очередей.

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