締める (shimeru) conjugation
to tie, to fasten, to tighten
締める (しめる, shimeru) 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 | 締める shimeru | 締めます shimemasu | The form you look up. Also the casual present and future. |
| Plain negative | 締めない shimenai | 締めません shimemasen | “doesn’t / won’t”. From here it conjugates like an i-adjective. |
| Plain past | 締めた shimeta | 締めました shimemashita | The casual past — same ending as the te-form, with た/だ. |
| Plain past negative | 締めなかった shimenakatta | 締めませんでした shimemasendeshita | “didn’t”. The negative past, still i-adjective-shaped. |
| Te-form | 締めて shimete | — | The connector: requests, linking clauses, ~ている. |
| Progressive (~ている) | 締めている shimeteiru | 締めています shimeteimasu | “is ~ing”, or an ongoing resulting state. |
| Desire (~たい) | 締めたい shimetai | 締めたいです shimetaidesu | “want to ~”. Behaves as an i-adjective. |
| Volitional | 締めよう shimeyou | 締めましょう shimemashou | “let’s ~” / “I think I’ll ~”. |
| Potential | 締められる shimerareru | 締められます shimeraremasu | “can ~”. What you could do; the object often takes が. |
| Passive | 締められる shimerareru | 締められます shimeraremasu | “is ~ed”. Also the honorific and the suffering passive. |
| Causative | 締めさせる shimesaseru | 締めさせます shimesasemasu | Make or let someone do it. |
| Causative-passive | 締めさせられる shimesaserareru | 締めさせられます shimesaseraremasu | Be made to do it — the long one. |
| Imperative | 締めろ shimero | 締めてください shimetekudasai | Blunt order. Use ~てください in real life. |
| Prohibitive | 締めるな shimeruna | — | “don’t!” — dictionary form + な. |
| Conditional (~ば) | 締めれば shimereba | — | “if ~”. General rules and hypotheticals. |
| Conditional (~たら) | 締めたら shimetara | — | “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.