触る (sawaru) conjugation
to touch, to feel
触る (さわる, sawaru) is a godan verb. Godan verbs change their final kana up and down its column of the kana chart — the a-row for negatives, the i-row before ます, the e-row for potential and ば. 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 | 触る sawaru | 触ります sawarimasu | The form you look up. Also the casual present and future. |
| Plain negative | 触らない sawaranai | 触りません sawarimasen | “doesn’t / won’t”. From here it conjugates like an i-adjective. |
| Plain past | 触った sawatta | 触りました sawarimashita | The casual past — same ending as the te-form, with た/だ. |
| Plain past negative | 触らなかった sawaranakatta | 触りませんでした sawarimasendeshita | “didn’t”. The negative past, still i-adjective-shaped. |
| Te-form | 触って sawatte | — | The connector: requests, linking clauses, ~ている. |
| Progressive (~ている) | 触っている sawatteiru | 触っています sawatteimasu | “is ~ing”, or an ongoing resulting state. |
| Desire (~たい) | 触りたい sawaritai | 触りたいです sawaritaidesu | “want to ~”. Behaves as an i-adjective. |
| Volitional | 触ろう sawarou | 触りましょう sawarimashou | “let’s ~” / “I think I’ll ~”. |
| Potential | 触れる sawareru | 触れます sawaremasu | “can ~”. What you could do; the object often takes が. |
| Passive | 触られる sawarareru | 触られます sawararemasu | “is ~ed”. Also the honorific and the suffering passive. |
| Causative | 触らせる sawaraseru | 触らせます sawarasemasu | Make or let someone do it. |
| Causative-passive | 触らされる sawarasareru | 触らされます sawarasaremasu | Be made to do it — the long one. |
| Imperative | 触れ saware | 触ってください sawattekudasai | Blunt order. Use ~てください in real life. |
| Prohibitive | 触るな sawaruna | — | “don’t!” — dictionary form + な. |
| Conditional (~ば) | 触れば sawareba | — | “if ~”. General rules and hypotheticals. |
| Conditional (~たら) | 触ったら sawattara | — | “if / when ~”. The everyday conditional. |
🔊 Tap any Japanese word to hear it spoken.
Why it conjugates this way
Godan verbs change their final kana up and down its column of the kana chart — the a-row for negatives, the i-row before ます, the e-row for potential and ば.
See the full rules on the verb conjugation guide.