How to Conjugate Réveiller (to Wake up) in French

In French, the verb  rà ©veiller  means to wake up or to awaken. You can remember it by thinking of the reveille of a bugle waking soldiers up in the morning. When you want to say things like I woke up or he is waking, youll need to know how to conjugate the verb. A quick lesson will show you how thats done. The Basic Conjugations of  Rà ©veiller Some French verbs are simpler to conjugate than others and rà ©veiller falls into the easier category. Thats because it is a regular -er verb, meaning it follows the most common conjugation rules found in the language. If youve studied similar words, you should be a little more comfortable memorizing this one. As with all conjugations, we must first identify the verb stem:  reveill-. To this, a variety of infinitive endings are added to create the various conjugations. All you have to do to learn these endings is look for the subject pronoun and the proper tense in the chart. For instance, I am waking up is  je rà ©veille  and we woke up is  nous rà ©veillions. You can make these easier to remember by practicing them every morning when you wake up. Present Future Imperfect je rveille rveillerai rveillais tu rveilles rveilleras rveillais il rveille rveillera rveillait nous rveillons rveillerons rveillions vous rveillez rveillerez rveilliez ils rveillent rveilleront rveillaient The Present Participle of  Rà ©veiller As with most French verbs, an -ant ending is added to the verb stem to create the present participle. For rà ©veiller, that forms the word rà ©veillant. Rà ©veiller  in the Compound Past Tense A  common way to express the past tense in French is the compound known as the  passà © composà ©. To form this, youll need the  auxiliary verb  avoir  as well as the  past participle  rà ©veillà ©. It comes together quickly: I woke up is  jai rà ©veillà ©Ã‚  and we woke up is  nous avons rà ©veillà ©. Notice how  avoir  was conjugated into the present tense according to the subject. Also, the past participle doesnt change, but it does take over the job of indicating that the act has already happened. More Simple Conjugations of  Rà ©veiller At times, you may need a few more simple forms of  rà ©veiller. The subjunctive, for example, implies some uncertainty to the action while the conditional says someone will wake up only if something else happens (the alarm goes off, perhaps). The passà © simple  and  the imperfect subjunctive are used less frequently but are good to know nonetheless. Subjunctive Conditional Pass Simple Imperfect Subjunctive je rveille rveillerais rveillai rveillasse tu rveilles rveillerais rveillas rveillasses il rveille rveillerait rveilla rveillt nous rveillions rveillerions rveillmes rveillassions vous rveilliez rveilleriez rveilltes rveillassiez ils rveillent rveilleraient rveillrent rveillassent The imperative verb mood is very useful with a verb like  rà ©veiller. It allows you to quickly command someone to Wake up! When using it, skip the subject pronoun and simply say, Rà ©veille  ! Imperative (tu) rveille (nous) rveillons (vous) rveillez