At times we need to give orders or make some sort of request. German has a special form for such purposes. We can address orders to one or two persons that we are familiar with or to strangers or people that we share a formal relationship with.

Ordering Friends Around

To make requests to friends you need the du-form of the verb you are about to use. For example:

kommen: du kommst

To create the imperative from this form, all you‘ve got to do is to eliminate the du and if the person is gone, there can‘t be a personal ending either, so you will also have to kill the -st. What‘s left is the imperative for a person that you know well.

du kommst turns into: Komm.

A few more examples that should also illustrate why it is important to start with the base of the du-form.

2 | "lesen" and "essen" are a bit special. They keep their s because it is part of the verb's stem

"schläfst" and "fährst" lose their Umlaut as there is none in their infinitive forms. While "sägen" keeps its Umlaut due to it being part of the infinitive.

Mal

You will come across the word mal very soon and it will annoy you as it very often doesn‘t mean anything by itself. You dictionary will tell you that it means: (one) time but in the following examples that wouldn‘t make any sense and simply is used to make your request sound friendlier:

• Komm mal! > Come!
• Mach mal! > Make!
• Schau mal! > Look!

Ordering several Friends Around

To make an informal request to more than one person, you need to work with the ihr-form:

• ihr kommt
• ihr geht
• ihr esst

It is even easier to create the imperative from this than before. All you‘ve got to do is eliminate the ihr:

• ihr kommt turns into: Kommt.
• ihr geht turns into: Geht.
• ihr esst turns into: Esst.

Et voilà. You are done.

The Formal Imperative

To make a formal request, singular or plural, you need to use the formal form as basis:

• Sie kommen
• Sie gehen
• Sie essen

Now you simply change the order of those two words and you have your formal imperative:

• Kommen Sie!
• Gehen Sie!
• Essen Sie!

It doesn‘t get any simpler. Now practice these forms by making tons of request to anyone who crosses your path. You can also use the mal here, but, in the formal form, it would sound a bit condescending and should be avoided.

• Kommt mal. - Kommen Sie mal.
• Geht mal. - Gehen Sie mal.
• Esst mal. - Essen Sie mal.

Important Notice

You don’t actually have to use the imperative form ever. You can also always simply ask a question. A few examples:

Please come here.
Imperativ: Komm bitte (mal) her.
Frage: Kommst du bitte (mal) her?

Please go away.
Imperativ: Geh bitte weg.
Frage: Gehst du bitte weg?

There’s no difference in the message. Only the tone of your voice decides the level of friendliness.