抱える (kakaeru) conjugation
to hold or carry under or in the arms
抱える (かかえる, kakaeru) 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 | 抱える kakaeru | 抱えます kakaemasu | The form you look up. Also the casual present and future. |
| Plain negative | 抱えない kakaenai | 抱えません kakaemasen | “doesn’t / won’t”. From here it conjugates like an i-adjective. |
| Plain past | 抱えた kakaeta | 抱えました kakaemashita | The casual past — same ending as the te-form, with た/だ. |
| Plain past negative | 抱えなかった kakaenakatta | 抱えませんでした kakaemasendeshita | “didn’t”. The negative past, still i-adjective-shaped. |
| Te-form | 抱えて kakaete | — | The connector: requests, linking clauses, ~ている. |
| Progressive (~ている) | 抱えている kakaeteiru | 抱えています kakaeteimasu | “is ~ing”, or an ongoing resulting state. |
| Desire (~たい) | 抱えたい kakaetai | 抱えたいです kakaetaidesu | “want to ~”. Behaves as an i-adjective. |
| Volitional | 抱えよう kakaeyou | 抱えましょう kakaemashou | “let’s ~” / “I think I’ll ~”. |
| Potential | 抱えられる kakaerareru | 抱えられます kakaeraremasu | “can ~”. What you could do; the object often takes が. |
| Passive | 抱えられる kakaerareru | 抱えられます kakaeraremasu | “is ~ed”. Also the honorific and the suffering passive. |
| Causative | 抱えさせる kakaesaseru | 抱えさせます kakaesasemasu | Make or let someone do it. |
| Causative-passive | 抱えさせられる kakaesaserareru | 抱えさせられます kakaesaseraremasu | Be made to do it — the long one. |
| Imperative | 抱えろ kakaero | 抱えてください kakaetekudasai | Blunt order. Use ~てください in real life. |
| Prohibitive | 抱えるな kakaeruna | — | “don’t!” — dictionary form + な. |
| Conditional (~ば) | 抱えれば kakaereba | — | “if ~”. General rules and hypotheticals. |
| Conditional (~たら) | 抱えたら kakaetara | — | “if / when ~”. The everyday conditional. |
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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.