聞こえる (kikoeru) conjugation
to be heard, to be audible
聞こえる (きこえる, kikoeru) 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 | 聞こえる kikoeru | 聞こえます kikoemasu | The form you look up. Also the casual present and future. |
| Plain negative | 聞こえない kikoenai | 聞こえません kikoemasen | “doesn’t / won’t”. From here it conjugates like an i-adjective. |
| Plain past | 聞こえた kikoeta | 聞こえました kikoemashita | The casual past — same ending as the te-form, with た/だ. |
| Plain past negative | 聞こえなかった kikoenakatta | 聞こえませんでした kikoemasendeshita | “didn’t”. The negative past, still i-adjective-shaped. |
| Te-form | 聞こえて kikoete | — | The connector: requests, linking clauses, ~ている. |
| Progressive (~ている) | 聞こえている kikoeteiru | 聞こえています kikoeteimasu | “is ~ing”, or an ongoing resulting state. |
| Desire (~たい) | 聞こえたい kikoetai | 聞こえたいです kikoetaidesu | “want to ~”. Behaves as an i-adjective. |
| Volitional | 聞こえよう kikoeyou | 聞こえましょう kikoemashou | “let’s ~” / “I think I’ll ~”. |
| Potential | 聞こえられる kikoerareru | 聞こえられます kikoeraremasu | “can ~”. What you could do; the object often takes が. |
| Passive | 聞こえられる kikoerareru | 聞こえられます kikoeraremasu | “is ~ed”. Also the honorific and the suffering passive. |
| Causative | 聞こえさせる kikoesaseru | 聞こえさせます kikoesasemasu | Make or let someone do it. |
| Causative-passive | 聞こえさせられる kikoesaserareru | 聞こえさせられます kikoesaseraremasu | Be made to do it — the long one. |
| Imperative | 聞こえろ kikoero | 聞こえてください kikoetekudasai | Blunt order. Use ~てください in real life. |
| Prohibitive | 聞こえるな kikoeruna | — | “don’t!” — dictionary form + な. |
| Conditional (~ば) | 聞こえれば kikoereba | — | “if ~”. General rules and hypotheticals. |
| Conditional (~たら) | 聞こえたら kikoetara | — | “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.