Comprendre — to understand | French Verb Chart

🇬🇧 Comprendre: prendre’s pattern, the learner’s first lifeline

Comprendre — to understand — is prendre with a prefix, and inherits every quirk of its parent chart: je comprends, tu comprends, il comprend, then the three-way plural — nous comprenons, vous comprenez, ils comprennent (single n, single n, double n with the open vowel). Passé composé j’ai compris, futur je comprendrai, subjonctif que je comprenne. If you’ve already met our prendre page, this table is revision; if not, learn them together — apprendre (to learn) makes it a trio, and the three cover taking, learning and understanding: the entire student experience in one conjugation pattern.

No verb earns its keep faster in real life: « je ne comprends pas » is the honest sentence that unlocks every stuck conversation, and its polite escort « vous pouvez répéter, s’il vous plaît ? » turns confusion into a lesson. The participle stands alone as agreement — « compris ! » (got it!) — and « c’est compris ? » closes instructions from teachers and parents across the francophone world. Subtlety for later: comprendre also means to include (« le prix comprend le petit-déjeuner » — breakfast included), which is why hotel small print conjugates it as often as classrooms do. Drill honestly: say je comprends when you do, je ne comprends pas when you don’t — the verb practises itself precisely when you need it most.