経る (heru) conjugation
to pass, to elapse, to experience
経る (へる, heru) is an ichidan verb. Ichidan verbs are the tidy ones: drop the final る and add the ending. Nothing inside the word ever changes. Every form below is tappable — hear it, then say it back.
Conjugation table
| Form | Plain (casual) | Polite (~ます) | When you use it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dictionary / plain | 経る heru | 経ます hemasu | The form you look up. Also the casual present and future. |
| Plain negative | 経ない henai | 経ません hemasen | “doesn’t / won’t”. From here it conjugates like an i-adjective. |
| Plain past | 経た heta | 経ました hemashita | The casual past — same ending as the te-form, with た/だ. |
| Plain past negative | 経なかった henakatta | 経ませんでした hemasendeshita | “didn’t”. The negative past, still i-adjective-shaped. |
| Te-form | 経て hete | — | The connector: requests, linking clauses, ~ている. |
| Progressive (~ている) | 経ている heteiru | 経ています heteimasu | “is ~ing”, or an ongoing resulting state. |
| Desire (~たい) | 経たい hetai | 経たいです hetaidesu | “want to ~”. Behaves as an i-adjective. |
| Volitional | 経よう heyou | 経ましょう hemashou | “let’s ~” / “I think I’ll ~”. |
| Potential | 経られる herareru | 経られます heraremasu | “can ~”. What you could do; the object often takes が. |
| Passive | 経られる herareru | 経られます heraremasu | “is ~ed”. Also the honorific and the suffering passive. |
| Causative | 経させる hesaseru | 経させます hesasemasu | Make or let someone do it. |
| Causative-passive | 経させられる hesaserareru | 経させられます hesaseraremasu | Be made to do it — the long one. |
| Imperative | 経ろ hero | 経てください hetekudasai | Blunt order. Use ~てください in real life. |
| Prohibitive | 経るな heruna | — | “don’t!” — dictionary form + な. |
| Conditional (~ば) | 経れば hereba | — | “if ~”. General rules and hypotheticals. |
| Conditional (~たら) | 経たら hetara | — | “if / when ~”. The everyday conditional. |
🔊 Tap any Japanese word to hear it spoken.
Why it conjugates this way
Ichidan verbs are the tidy ones: drop the final る and add the ending. Nothing inside the word ever changes.
See the full rules on the verb conjugation guide.