考える (kangaeru) conjugation
to think (about); to consider
考える (かんがえる, kangaeru) 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 | 考える kangaeru | 考えます kangaemasu | The form you look up. Also the casual present and future. |
| Plain negative | 考えない kangaenai | 考えません kangaemasen | “doesn’t / won’t”. From here it conjugates like an i-adjective. |
| Plain past | 考えた kangaeta | 考えました kangaemashita | The casual past — same ending as the te-form, with た/だ. |
| Plain past negative | 考えなかった kangaenakatta | 考えませんでした kangaemasendeshita | “didn’t”. The negative past, still i-adjective-shaped. |
| Te-form | 考えて kangaete | — | The connector: requests, linking clauses, ~ている. |
| Progressive (~ている) | 考えている kangaeteiru | 考えています kangaeteimasu | “is ~ing”, or an ongoing resulting state. |
| Desire (~たい) | 考えたい kangaetai | 考えたいです kangaetaidesu | “want to ~”. Behaves as an i-adjective. |
| Volitional | 考えよう kangaeyou | 考えましょう kangaemashou | “let’s ~” / “I think I’ll ~”. |
| Potential | 考えられる kangaerareru | 考えられます kangaeraremasu | “can ~”. What you could do; the object often takes が. |
| Passive | 考えられる kangaerareru | 考えられます kangaeraremasu | “is ~ed”. Also the honorific and the suffering passive. |
| Causative | 考えさせる kangaesaseru | 考えさせます kangaesasemasu | Make or let someone do it. |
| Causative-passive | 考えさせられる kangaesaserareru | 考えさせられます kangaesaseraremasu | Be made to do it — the long one. |
| Imperative | 考えろ kangaero | 考えてください kangaetekudasai | Blunt order. Use ~てください in real life. |
| Prohibitive | 考えるな kangaeruna | — | “don’t!” — dictionary form + な. |
| Conditional (~ば) | 考えれば kangaereba | — | “if ~”. General rules and hypotheticals. |
| Conditional (~たら) | 考えたら kangaetara | — | “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.