Konjunktiv II.

Konjunktiv II marks a sentence as not factual: it might be a wish, a polite request, a hypothetical, a regret, or words someone else said that you don't want to take responsibility for. English handles each of these with its own pattern — "could you," "if I had," "she said she had" — but in German one mood does all of it.

Two forms cover almost everything. würde + Infinitiv is the easy, regular workhorse — works for any verb, sounds totally natural. A small group of high-frequency verbs prefer their own Konjunktiv II forms instead: hätte, wäre, könnte, müsste, wüsste, käme, gäbe. Use those when they're available; use würde + Infinitiv for everything else.

würde is the Konjunktiv II of werden. It works exactly like an English "would": you conjugate it for person and number, the lexical verb stays in the infinitive, and the two pieces form a verb bracket — würde at position 2, infinitive at the end.

For these high-frequency verbs, the standalone K2 form is universal in both speech and writing. Using würde + Infinitiv with them sounds clumsy at best, wrong at worst.

Infinitive	Präteritum	Konjunktiv II	Meaning
haben	hatte	hätte	would have
sein	war	wäre	would be
werden	wurde	würde	would become
können	konnte	könnte	could
müssen	musste	müsste	ought to / would have to
dürfen	durfte	dürfte	might / probably
sollen	sollte	sollte	should
wissen	wusste	wüsste	would know
geben	gab	gäbe	would give / there would be
gehen	ging	ginge	would go
kommen	kam	käme	would come
tun	tat	täte	would do
finden	fand	fände	would find / think
bleiben	blieb	bliebe	would stay

The pattern

Three full conjugations to know cold

If the verb is…	Use this Konjunktiv II form
haben, sein, werden	Always use hätte, wäre, würde.
A modal (können, müssen, dürfen, sollen, wollen, mögen)	Always use the modal's own K2: könnte, müsste, dürfte, sollte, wollte, möchte.
One of the high-frequency strong verbs (wissen, geben, kommen, gehen, tun, finden, bleiben)	Use the standalone form (wüsste, gäbe, käme…). würde + Infinitiv sounds clumsy.
Any other strong verb (schreiben, lesen, fahren, sehen, sprechen…)	Use würde + Infinitiv. The textbook forms (schriebe, läse, führe) exist but sound antique.
Any weak verb (the vast majority — machen, lernen, arbeiten…)	Always use würde + Infinitiv. The standalone form is identical to Präteritum and would be ambiguous.

To make any request sound courteous, swap the indicative for Konjunktiv II. The difference between Kannst du mir helfen? and Könntest du mir helfen? is the difference between a friend asking a friend and a guest asking a stranger. Tiny grammatical change, huge tonal shift.

Blunt (indicative)	Polite (Konjunktiv II)
Kannst du mir helfen?Can you help me?	Könntest du mir helfen?Could you help me?
Ich will einen Kaffee.I want a coffee.	Ich hätte gern einen Kaffee. / Ich möchte einen Kaffee.I'd like a coffee.
Hast du Zeit?Do you have time?	Hättest du vielleicht kurz Zeit?Would you maybe have a moment?
Machst du das Fenster zu?Will you close the window?	Würdest du bitte das Fenster zumachen?Would you please close the window?
Ich brauche einen Termin.I need an appointment.	Ich bräuchte einen Termin.I'd need an appointment.

Three polite formulas worth memorizing

To talk about a situation that isn't real — what you'd do if X, what would happen if Y — put both halves into Konjunktiv II. The wenn-clause states the unreal condition; the main clause states the unreal consequence.

Dropping the wenn (inverted condition)

In writing and slightly formal speech, you can drop wenn and start the sentence with the verb. The meaning is the same, the tone is slightly more literary.

als ob — "as if"

The subordinator als ob ("as if") always takes K2 in its clause. It introduces a hypothetical comparison: someone behaves as if something were true, when in fact it isn't.

To talk about an unreal past — something that didn't happen, but might have — use hätte or wäre (depending on which auxiliary the verb takes in Perfekt) plus the past participle. There's no past form of würde + Infinitiv; this construction replaces it.

Aux. in Perfekt	Past K2 form	Example
haben	hätte + Partizip II	Ich hätte das nicht gesagt.I wouldn't have said that.
sein	wäre + Partizip II	Ich wäre früher gekommen.I would have come earlier.
modal + infinitive	hätte + Infinitiv + modal-Inf.	Du hättest es mir sagen müssen.You should have told me.

German uses subjunctive forms in indirect speech to mark distance. Newspapers and formal writing prefer Konjunktiv I (er habe, er sei, er komme). In everyday speech most Germans use Konjunktiv II (er hätte, er wäre, er käme) — especially when the K1 form happens to look identical to the indicative (then K2 is mandatory, even in writing).

The basic transformation

Konjunktiv I — the journalist's mood

Infinitive	K1 (er-form)	Used when
haben	er habe	Distinct from indicative er hat → K1 works.
sein	er sei	Special form. Always K1, always recognizable.
kommen	er komme	Distinct from er kommt.
können	er könne	Distinct from er kann.
machen (3rd person plural)	sie machen	Same as indicative sie machen → switch to K2 sie würden machen.

The rule of thumb: if K1 looks like the indicative, slide to K2 (or würde + Inf.) to keep the reported-speech marking visible.

Past indirect speech

Whichever past tense the original speaker used (Perfekt, Präteritum, Plusquamperfekt), indirect speech collapses it into a single past form: K1 perfect (er habe gemacht / er sei gekommen) for writing, K2 perfect (er hätte gemacht / er wäre gekommen) for speech.

With or without dass

Indirect speech can be introduced with dass + verb-final word order, or without — keeping main-clause word order. The verb still gets a subjunctive marker, but the syntax stays loose.