[Grammar] 고 싶어요 want to

-고 싶다 want to

-고 싶다 means ‘want to do something’ or ‘would like to do something’.  The subject of -고 싶다 should be ‘I’ or ‘You’.  If you want to put ‘he/she’ as a subject, you should ‘-고 싶어하다’. 

1) Present tense :-고 싶어요
먹다(to eat)  I want to eat  :  먹고 싶어요.
자다(to sleep) I want to sleep : 자고 싶어요.
가다(to go)  I want to go : 가고 싶어요.
배우다(to learn)  I want to learn : 배우고 싶어요.
말하다(to speak)  I want to speak  : 말하고 싶어요.

2) Past tense : -고 싶었어요
먹다   I wanted to eat : 먹고 싶었어요.
자다   I wanted to sleep : 자고 싶었어요.
가다   I wanted to go : 가고 싶었어요.
배우다 I wanted to learn : 배우고 싶었어요.
말하다  I wanted to speak : 말하고 싶었어요.

3) Future tense (predict, guess) : – 고 싶을 거예요
먹다  I might want to eat : 먹고 싶을 거예요.
자다   I might want to sleep : 자고 싶을 거예요.
가다   I might want to go : 가고 싶을 거예요.
배우다  I might want to learn : 배우고 싶을 거예요.
말하다  might want to speak : 말하고 싶을 거예요.

4) Third person subject : -고 싶어하다
먹다  he/she wants to eat : 먹고 싶어해요.
자다  he/she wants to sleep : 자고 싶어해요.
가다  he/she wants to go : 가고 싶어해요.
배우다 he/she wants to learn : 배우고 싶어해요.
말하다 he/she wants to speak : 말하고 싶어해요.

5) Short Negation : 안 + -고 싶어요
먹다(to eat)  I don’t want to eat  :  안 먹고 싶어요.
자다(to sleep) I don’t want to sleep : 안 자고 싶어요.
가다(to go)  I don’t want to go : 안 가고 싶어요.
배우다(to learn)  I don’t want to learn : 안 배우고 싶어요.
말하다(to speak)  I don’t want to speak  : 말 안 하고 싶어요.

6) Long negation : -고 싶+지 않아요
먹다(to eat)  I don’t want to eat  :   먹고 싶지 않아요.
자다(to sleep) I don’t want to sleep :  자고 싶지 않아요.
가다(to go)  I don’t want to go :  가고 싶지 않아요.
배우다(to learn)  I don’t want to learn :  배우고 싶지 않아요.
말하다(to speak)  I don’t want to speak  : 말하고 싶지 않아요.

You can listen to the pronunciation here.

3 thoughts on “[Grammar] 고 싶어요 want to

Leave a Reply

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. Log Out /  Change )

Twitter picture

You are commenting using your Twitter account. Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. Log Out /  Change )

Connecting to %s

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.