The ultra quick guide to Japanese verb conjugation: the passive voice
The passive voice is used when what would normally be the object of a sentence becomes the subject. Eg instead of "Fred broke the window" the passive would be "the Window was broken by Fred"
Heads up! Although the passive tense is grammatically possible it is not often used with some verbs and in some cases it could sound weird
| my car was stolen | kuruma ga nusumaremashita |
| the book was written last year | sono hon wa kyonen kakeremashita |
How to conjugate the Japanese passive voice
| Class 1 / c-stem verbs | Positive | Negative |
|---|---|---|
| Plain | stem + areru | stem + arenai |
| Polite | stem + aremasu | stem + aremasen |
| Class 2 / v-stem verbs | Positive | Negative |
|---|---|---|
| Plain | stem + rareru | stem + rarenai |
| Polite | stem + raremasu | stem + raremasen |