Swedish verb· top 500 most common

ligga

lie/²lɪɡːa/

Meaning

lie

In Swedish: vara i vågrätt läge, vila; vara placerad

Conjugation

Conjugation of ligga (lie)
Infinitive	att ligga	to lie
Present	ligger	jag ligger
Past	låg	jag låg
Supine	legat	used after har / hade
Perfect	har legat	jag har legat
Past perfect	hade legat	jag hade legat
Future	ska ligga	or: kommer att ligga
Conditional	skulle ligga	jag skulle ligga
Imperative	ligg!	a command
Present participle	liggande	-ing, used as an adjective

Passive (-s form)

Passive of ligga
Infinitive	liggas
Present	liggs
Past	lågs
Supine	legats

Group 4: strong and irregular verbs. Strong verbs change their vowel and have a supine in -it (skriva, skrev, skrivit); irregular ones such as göra and ha follow no pattern. Both have to be learned one by one. Swedish verbs don't change for person: jag, du, hon, vi and de all use ligger. See the four verb groups explained.

Practise ligga

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Yesterday I … (ligga). Which is the past tense?

ligga in a sentence

ligga i sängen
lie in bed
boken ligger på bordet
the book is on the table
gatan ligger i Göteborg
that street is in Göteborg
hon ligger trea i tävlingen
she is lying third in the competition
det ligger mycket i vad du säger
there's a lot to what you say
Hon låg på marken
She was lying on the ground
Han ligger etta / Han ligger först / Han ligger på första plats
He's in first place

Expressions

ligga i luften
be in the air
ligga lågt
lie low
ligga i blodet
be part of one's character
vad ligger bakom beslutet?
what is behind the decision?
du ligger illa till
you're in a pickle

Questions

What does ligga mean in English?

ligga means “lie”.

What is the past tense of ligga?

The past tense of ligga is låg (“jag låg”). The supine is legat, used in “jag har legat”.

What is the present tense of ligga?

ligger, the same for every person: jag ligger, du ligger, vi ligger.

Where the course teaches it

Swedish verbs: ligga, stå, sitta
Complete Swedish – Season 2

Origin

From Old Swedish liggia, from Old Norse liggja, from Proto-Germanic *ligjaną, from Proto-Indo-European *legʰ-.

Nearby common words

ligga is number 448 in our frequency list. These words come just before and after it.

444dricka drink
445gått walked, gone
446stoppa stop, put
447herr Mr.
449vore were
450chef head, director
451erat alternative form of ert (“your, yours”)
452sej oneself, pronunciation spelling of sig

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Sources: Folkets lexikon (CC BY-SA 2.5) and Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 4.0), edited by Lingolib. Recording: Wikimedia Commons. Browse the dictionary