Phrasal verbs / compound verbs

It would seem that the verb, which is a part of speech and answers a certain question, has so many forms and rules. Species, persons and numbers, declensions, education, tense, use, etc. You can go crazy, right? But in fact, not everything is so scary. In practice, you are unlikely to need knowledge about the properties of the verb. No one will stop you in the middle of the street and ask you which verbs are transitive and which are not. 

However, knowledge is power. And knowledge of the rules of the English language is generally a power available only to the elite. Joke. In fact, you need to study the rules, because without them you won’t be able to fully learn the language, despite all the advertising that exists on the Internet. 

So, compound verbs are called because they consist of several words. In our case, this is a verb + a preposition. Also, these verbs are called phrasal verbs. 

Phrasal verbs differ from simple verbs in that they radically change their meaning when used with a preposition. They will not be translated literally like simple verbs with prepositions, so it is very important to pay enough attention to studying them. 

 

Separable and inseparable  

The thing is that in English a sentence can easily end with a preposition. The fact is that the preposition is there for a reason, it will be part of the phrasal verb, which was divided with the preposition with other words. 

It is very easy to get caught at this stage without knowing that there are separable and inseparable verbs. That is, some of the phrasal verbs can be separated from the preposition using other words, while others cannot. We look at the signs and shake our heads! 

Inseparable verbs 

• break into  
• call on  
• care for  
• check in/out  
• count on  
• disagree with  
• drop by  
• fall off  
• get along with  
• get on  
• get out of  
• get over  
• get through  
• get up  
• go over  
• grow up  
• keep on  
• keep up with  
• look after  
• look for  
• look like  
• look out for  
• put up with  
• run across  
• run out of  
• run over  
• show up  
• take after  
• take off  
• take up  
• throw up  

Separable verbs 

• bring about  
• call back  
• call off  
• call up  
• check out  
• clean up  
• do over  
• drop off  
• figure out  
• fill in  
• find out  
• get back  
• give away  
• give back  
• give up  
• hand in  
• hang up  
• kick out  
• look over  
• pick up  
• put away  
• put off  
• put on  
• show off  
• take off  
• take over  
• tear down  
• think over  
• throw away  
• try on  
• turn on/off  
• turn up/down  
• wake up  

It's probably easiest to learn phrasal verbs by grouping them by base word rather than just a long list. The most popular phrasal verbs include the following: 

Go 

• Go about 
• Go after 
• Go with 
• Go ahead 
• Go along with 
• Go away 
• Go back 
• Go back on 

Get 

• Get about/around  
• Get across 
• Get ahead 
• Get along 
• Get at 
• Get away 
• Get back 
• Get back to 
• Get behind 
• Get by 
• Get down 
• Get down to 
• Get in 
• Get into 

Look 

• Look at 
• Look for 
• Look forward 
• Look after 
• Look back 
• Look down to 
• Look into 
• Look out 
• Look ahead 

Make  

• Make after 
• Make away 
• Make for 
• Make into 
• Make of 
• Make off 
• Make out 
• Make over 
• Make up for 
• Make up to 

Give 

• Give away 
• Give back 
• Give in 
• Give off  
• Give out 
• Give up 

In total, there are more than five thousand phrasal verbs in English, but only a few hundred of them are actively used in everyday speech. Therefore, it is important to learn them, because they will help you take your conversations with foreigners to a new level.