Personalpronomen

Use the subject pronoun that matches the person or group in the sentence. In writing, Sie with a capital letter is normally the formal 'you'. sie with a small letter means 'she' or 'they', but at the beginning of a sentence it is also written Sie, so you must use the verb form and context to decide the meaning.

Subject pronouns in German stand in the nominative. They replace the subject of the sentence: ich, du, er, sie, es, wir, ihr, sie, Sie.

Subject pronouns in the nominative

• Sie kommst morgen.

  Sie kommen morgen.

  Use the formal pronoun Sie with the plural verb form kommen. kommst is the 2nd person singular form and goes with du, not with formal Sie.

• Der Tisch ist alt. Es steht im Büro.

  Der Tisch ist alt. Er steht im Büro.

  Der Tisch is masculine, so the pronoun must be er, not es. Learners often use es because they think of a general 'it' for all things.

• Wir arbeitet heute.

  Wir arbeiten heute.

  With wir (we), the verb must be in the plural form: wir arbeiten. Arbeitet is the 3rd person singular form (er/sie/es arbeitet), so the original sentence is incorrect.

• Use Sie with a capital letter in letters, emails, service situations, and when speaking politely to one person.
• sie can mean 'she' or 'they'. The verb helps you tell them apart: sie kommt = she comes, sie kommen = they come.
• Er, sie, es replace a noun by grammatical gender: der Tisch → er, die Lampe → sie, das Mädchen → es. Here, das Mädchen is grammatically neuter, so we use es, even though it refers to a girl.
• This lesson stays in the nominative. Object pronouns like mich, dich, ihn come later in the Akkusativ and Dativ points.