柔らかい (yawarakai) conjugation
soft (in reference to texture), tender
柔らかい (やわらかい, yawarakai) is an i-adjective. I-adjectives carry their own tense: drop the final い and the endings attach straight to the stem. No だ, no です needed to make a complete sentence.
Conjugation table
| Form | Plain (casual) | Polite (~です) | When you use it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dictionary / plain | 柔らかい yawarakai | 柔らかいです yawarakaidesu | The form you look up. Also the casual “is ~”. |
| Negative | 柔らかくない yawarakakunai | 柔らかくないです yawarakakunaidesu | “is not ~”. |
| Past | 柔らかかった yawarakakatta | 柔らかかったです yawarakakattadesu | “was ~”. |
| Past negative | 柔らかくなかった yawarakakunakatta | 柔らかくなかったです yawarakakunakattadesu | “was not ~”. |
| Te-form | 柔らかくて yawarakakute | — | Links to the next clause: “~ and …”. |
| Adverb | 柔らかく yawarakaku | — | Turns it into “~ly”, describing a verb. |
| Before a noun | 柔らかい〜 yawarakai〜 | — | How it attaches when it modifies a noun. |
| Conditional (~ば/なら) | 柔らかければ yawarakakereba | — | “if it is ~”. |
| Conditional (~たら) | 柔らかかったら yawarakakattara | — | “if / when it is ~”. The everyday conditional. |
| Become (~なる) | 柔らかくなる yawarakakunaru | 柔らかくなります yawarakakunarimasu | “becomes ~” — the change-of-state form. |
| Too much (~すぎる) | 柔らかすぎる yawarakasugiru | 柔らかすぎます yawarakasugimasu | “too ~”. |
| Looks ~ (~そう) | 柔らかそう yawarakasou | 柔らかそうです yawarakasoudesu | “looks / seems ~” from appearance. |
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Why it conjugates this way
I-adjectives carry their own tense: drop the final い and the endings attach straight to the stem. No だ, no です needed to make a complete sentence.
See the full rules in the adjective conjugation guide.