How to Conjugate the Tai Form of Japanese

Deriving "--tai" Form

• 1

  Find the target verb in a Japanese-English dictionary. This will show you the dictionary stem form of the verb.

• 2

  Check the ending of the stem to see which category of Japanese verbs it falls into.

• 3

  Alter the stem of regular verbs to the --tai form by following this rule: change --u to --i; change --ku to --ki; change --gu to gi; change --su to --shi; change --tsu to --chi; change --nu to --ni; change --bu to --bi; change --mu to --mi; change --ru to --ri; change --iru to --i; change --eru to --e.

• 4

  Alter the stem of irregular verbs to the --tai form: change "suru" to "shi;" change "kuru" to "kill;" change "ru" to "i;" change "da" to "de ari."

• 5

  Add --tai to the altered stem.

Conjugating the Positive

• 6

  Replace the --i of the --tai form with --katta to form the past tense such as "wanted to."

• 7

  Replace --i of the --tai form with --kattara to form a conditional statement such as "if want to."

• 8

  Replace --i of the --tai form with --kunatta to form the expression that you have come to want to do something.

Conjugate the Negative

• 9

  Replace the --i of the "-tai" to "--ku nai". This will form the negative ("do not want to") form of the verb (see reference 1).

• 10

  Replace the --i of the "-ku nai" to "--ku nakatta". This will form the past negative ("did not want to") form of the verb.

• 11

  Replace --i of the --ku nai form with "--ku nakunatta". This will form the expression that you have come to not want to do something.