Prendre, Apprendre, Comprendre: One Verb, Six for the Price of One

In the video, Léa plays a word game: take a set of letters and build the longest French word you can. The answers climb in a straight line — prendre (7 letters), reprendre (9), apprendre (9) — because French verbs are built like Lego. One root, a shelf of prefixes.

Which is very good news. Learn prendre properly and five more verbs arrive free, fully conjugated, with no extra work.

The conjugation everything else copies

Prendre — to take:

• je prends
• tu prends
• il / elle prend
• nous prenons — the d disappears
• vous prenez — still no d
• ils / elles prennent — double n

Two things to actually watch:

• The d only survives in the singular. Je prends but nous prenons. Writing nous prendons is the most common written mistake with this verb.
• prennent is one syllable-ish, not three. It sounds like pren with an open è, and the -ent is completely silent — as it is in every French third-person plural.

Past participle: pris. J'ai pris le métro.

The five that come free

Every one of these conjugates exactly like prendre, in every tense. No exceptions, no surprises:

• apprendre — to learn (and to teach) · j'ai appris
• comprendre — to understand (and to include) · j'ai compris
• reprendre — to take back, to have more, to resume · j'ai repris
• surprendre — to surprise · j'ai surpris
• entreprendre — to undertake · j'ai entrepris

So nous comprenons, ils apprennent, vous reprenez. Once the pattern is in your hands, you are conjugating six verbs and thinking about one.

⚠️ The trap: perdre is not in the family

Perdre (to lose) differs from prendre by a single letter and behaves completely differently. It is a regular -re verb:

• je perds, nous perdons — the d stays
• past participle perdu, not pris

Compare them side by side once and the difference sticks: nous prenons / nous perdons. One drops the d, one keeps it.

Apprendre: learn and teach

French uses one verb for both directions, and the preposition decides which:

• J'apprends le français. — I'm learning French.
• J'apprends à nager. — I'm learning to swim. (apprendre à + infinitive)
• Il m'apprend le français. — He teaches me French.
• Elle apprend à son fils à lire. — She's teaching her son to read.

Enseigner also exists for teaching, but it is the formal, institutional word — il enseigne à l'université. In everyday speech, apprendre does both jobs.

Comprendre: understand and include

• Je comprends. — I understand.
• Je n'ai pas compris. — I didn't get that. (say this often; it is not rude)
• Le prix comprend le petit-déjeuner. — The price includes breakfast.
• Service compris — service included. Tout compris — all inclusive.

You will meet the second meaning on every French menu, hotel page and quotation you ever read.

Reprendre: the most useful of the lot

Three everyday meanings, all common:

• Tu reprends du gâteau ? — Would you like some more cake? (at every French table)
• On reprend lundi. — We start again on Monday.
• Je reprends mes affaires. — I'm taking my things back.

Prendre on its own: the phrases you'll use daily

• prendre un café — to have a coffee (French takes a drink, never has one)
• prendre le métro / le bus / le train — to take the metro, bus, train
• prendre une décision — to make a decision (never faire une décision)
• prendre son temps — to take one's time
• prendre rendez-vous — to make an appointment
• prendre froid — to catch a cold
• prendre quelque chose au sérieux — to take something seriously
• se prendre la tête — to overthink, to wind yourself up. Familier, and worth its own lesson: tu me prends la tête.

Prendre une décision deserves a highlight. English makes a decision; French takes one. Getting this pair the wrong way round is one of the most audible translation errors an English speaker makes.

Why verb families are worth building

French irregular verbs look like a long list until you notice that most of them come in clusters. Prendre gives you six. Mettre gives you permettre, promettre, remettre, admettre. Venir gives you devenir, revenir, prévenir, se souvenir. Learn the head of each family and you have collapsed twenty separate memorisation jobs into four.

Keep going with the verbs you use every morning in French morning routine verbs, or sort out the preposition that follows them in à or de. Want the conjugations drilled properly with a certified teacher? Book a first lesson.