Why does the German passive voice cause so much trouble? Many languages have a passive voice as well, however, compared to other languages there is a tiny difference, which obviously makes it look difficult. Once you realize what is different you might be able to use it correctly.

When comparing the English passive voice with the German one, you will find some differences.

Die Tür wird geöffnet.

The door is being opened.

Apart from the fact that in German there is no –ing form, we can see that the auxiliary verb is different for both languages. English uses ‘to be’, while German uses for the passive voice ‘werden’.

‘werden’- Passiv vs. ‘sein’- Passiv

A common mistake is to believe that the English sentence translates to this: Die Tür ist geöffnet.

The thing is that the sentence is correct. It just means something else. As soon as we talk about an action, we need to use ‘werden’. The “other” passive voice, which is built with ‘sein’ (to be), does not express an action, but a state or a result. Let’s compare the following two sentences:

Die Tür wird geöffnet.

The door is being opened.

Die Tür ist geöffnet.

The door is opened.

The first sentence means that in this very moment somebody is opening the door, the action is still going on. The second sentence tells us that the door is already open, we could also say:

Die Tür ist offen.

The door is open.

In both cases where ‘sein’ has been used, we would see an open door. What is the difference between ‘geöffnet’ and ‘offen’? In the first case you can still feel that before somebody had opened the door. In fact, you see that from the past tense:

Die Tür ist geöffnet worden.

Having nothing else than the adjective ‘offen’, we don’t know if the door has ever been closed.

The “normal” ‘werden’-passive voice is called ‘Handlungspassiv’ (Handlung – action) or ‘Vorgangspassiv’ (Vorgang – process), while the “other” ‘sein’-passive voice is called ‘Zustandspassiv’ (statal passive). So, we get:

Handlungspassiv: werden + Partizip II (past participle) Zustandspassiv: sein + Partizip II

What is the difference between the next two sentences?

Die Kartoffeln werden gekocht.

Die Kartoffeln sind gekocht.

Only the ones of the last sentence you can eat, the potatoes of the first sentence are still cooking.

Most of the verbs can build only the ‘Handlungspassiv’

To take a verb like ‘öffnen’ or ‘kochen’ as an example has the advantages that it can be used either as an action or a state. You can open something, and then this thing is open, or you can cook something and then it is cooked. However, the disadvantage is that this is not the case for most of the verbs. That might be the reason for the difficulty to use it.

Let’s take a verb like ‘schicken’ (‘to send’). You can immediately see that it is a pure action verb, there is no way to express the result with the same verb. You might say: The letter has arrived, or something similar, but you can’t express the idea of arriving using the verb ‘schicken’. So the following sentence must be incorrect:

Incorrect: *Der Brief ist an die Firma geschickt.

Correct: Der Brief wird an die Firma geschickt.

The letter is being sent/will be sent to the company.

Past tense of the ‘Handlungspassiv’

Perfekt: Der Brief ist an die Firma geschickt worden.

Präteritum: Der Brief wurde an die Firma geschickt.

The letter has been sent to the company.

Notice that the past tense of the Handlungspassiv can have two forms (Perfekt or Präteritum) and that for both tenses the auxiliary ‘werden’ must be used.

Perfekt: ‘sein’ + Partizip II + worden

Präteritum: wurde(n) + Partizip II

How to get from the active voice to the passive voice?

In order to understand how a sentence with passive voice can be built, we first need to compare the active voice and the passive voice and have a look at the differences. What would be the active voice of the last sentence?

Die Sekretärin schickt den Brief an die Firma.

The secretary sends the letter to the company.

The person carrying out the action (the subject of the active sentence or nominative case) is usually omitted in the passive voice or it can be expressed with the preposition ‘von’ (by). The accusative case (direct object) of the active sentence (den Brief) is turned into the nominative case (subject) of the passive voice (der Brief). The other parts, like the preposition (an die Firma), are not being changed.

Die Sekretärin schickt den Brief an die Firma

Nom.                       Akk.

Der Brief wird (von der Sekretärin) an die Firma geschickt.

Nom.

The letter is sent (by the secretary) to the company.

What does happen with the other sentence parts?

As example, we take a sentence with a dative case. How to translate the English sentence: I was told that …?  Let’s start with the active voice:

Jemand hat mir gesagt, dass …

Somebody has told me that ….

In this sentence, there is no direct object we could convert to a subject. And the dative case will not be changed.

Mir wurde gesagt, dass ….

I was told that ….

Function of the passive voice

Let’s see some examples where the active voice is not wrong, but inadequate:

Der Sturm hat die Häuser zerstört.

The storm has destroyed the houses.

Die Häuser wurden (durch den Sturm) zerstört.

The houses have been destroyed by the storm.

In the active voice, the storm appears as the agent. However, when we hear this – let’s say – in the news, we are more interested in the fact that the houses have been destroyed and very likely less interested in the fact that the storm is to blame for it. The passive voice stresses the action, not the agent, who is carrying it out. The reasons for this can be varying: we don’t know who is doing it, we don’t want to say it, it is not important etc.

Therefore, the passive voice would be the better option for the news. Notice that ‘durch’ is used instead of ‘von’, when the agent is not a person.

Viele Autos sind gestohlen worden/wurden gestohlen.

Many cars have been/were stolen.

What would be the active voice?

Jemand hat die Autos gestohlen. /Diebe haben die Autos gestohlen.

Somebody has stolen the cars. /Thieves have stolen the cars.

Of course, it was somebody, and of course, this somebody is called a thief. That is nothing new we need to know. So again, the passive voice is the better choice.

Which kind of verbs can build a passive voice?

Intuitively, you will feel that not all verbs can build a passive voice.

How could we build the passive voice of a verb like ‘gehen’ (to go) or ‘schwimmen’ (to swim)? Let’s do it in a more structured way.

In German, there are three groups of verbs. The first group can build the passive voice, the second often does, and the last can’t.

1) Transitive verbs

These verbs require the accusative case and use as auxiliary verb for the Perfekt ‘haben’. It is also the biggest group. They are the most likely ones to build a passive voice. Here, you will find verbs like ‘haben, brauchen, essen, kaufen, sehen, bringen, malen etc. (Exceptions are ‚haben, kennen, wissen, es gibt, freuen, ärgern etc. and all reflexive verbs)

Er hat gestern das Bild gemalt.

He made the painting yesterday.

Das Bild wurde gestern (von ihm) gemalt.

The painting has been done (by him) yesterday.

2) Intransitive verbs

These verbs don’t have an accusative case, but they also use ‘haben’ in the Perfekt. Examples are ‘schlafen, tanzen, lachen, helfen, antworten, sprechen’ etc.

Since they have no accusative, how can we build the passive voice?

Gestern haben sie viel getanzt.

They danced a lot yesterday.

Gestern wurde viel getanzt. / Es wurde gestern viel getanzt.

Gestern haben wir über das neue Projekt gesprochen.

We talked about the new project yesterday.

Es wurde gestern über das neue Projekt gesprochen./Gestern wurde über das neue Projekt gesprochen.

First, notice that it is hard to find an English translation for the passive voice. Second, we need to introduce ‘es’ (it) to make sure that the verb is in the second position. Third, not all verbs of this group can build a passive voice.

3) Ergative verbs

These verbs express a movement or a change of state and their auxiliary verb is ‘sein’, like ‘gehen, laufen, springen, aufstehen, einschlafen, werden’ etc. These verbs can’t build the passive voice.

Notice that there are some exceptions. ‘fahren’ typically belongs to this group (to go by), but in the case it takes an accusative case it behaves like a transitive verb (to drive), for example:

Er fährt mit dem Auto.

He goes by car.

Here, we can’t build a passive voice, but in another case we can:

Er fährt das Auto.

He drives the car.

Das Auto wird von ihm gefahren.

Conclusions

The passive voice is a very useful tool, especially when we want to focus on the action and the person or thing “suffering” from the action. It is often used to describe processes like in manuals, recipes etc., where the performing subject is not of great importance.