The 82 Most Common Verbs In Toki Pona (With Pictures)

Learning verbs is important for any language, as you won’t really be able to do much without them.

Verbs (nimi pali) can, however, be tricky in toki pona. This is because there are only 125 root words in the language, and many of these have multiple meanings. Add to that the lack of consensus on which verbs to use in a given sentence, and you’ve got a recipe for confusion.

---

---

That’s why we’ve taken this collection of verbs from the official Toki Pona Dictionary, compiled by the language’s creator, Sonja Lang. This comprehensive dictionary gives each entry a score to signify how commonly used it is compared with its synonyms.

Our list includes the translations with the highest scores, so you can rest assured that you’re always using the most popular word.

You might also be interested in our FREE Toki Pona Audio and Picture Dictionary app for Android:

How do verbs work in toki pona?

toki pona has a simple grammatical structure, based on a small number of root words. Each word can have multiple meanings, depending on how and where it’s used in a sentence, and almost all words can be used as verbs, nouns, adjectives, and adverbs.

For example, “moku” can mean both “to eat” and “food”.

While this can be slightly confusing when you first start learning the language, it’s actually quite straightforward once you get used to it. In most cases, the meaning of a word is clear from the context in which it’s used.

toki pona verb conjugation

The good news is, verbs in toki pona aren’t conjugated, so you don’t need to worry about changing the ending of a word to indicate tense or person. What this means is that a verb will always have the same form, regardless of who is doing the action or when it’s happening.

For example, the verb “moku” can be used to mean “I eat/ate”, “you eat/ate”, etc.

So, now that you know how verbs work in toki pona, let’s take a look at some of the most common ones.

List of 82 Verbs in toki pona

toki pona Verbs 1 – 16

Verbs 1 – 16 (English)	nimi pali 1 – 16 (toki pona)
be	lon
have	jo
do	pali
go	tawa
see	lukin
know	sona
like	pona tawa
want	wile
work	pali
come	kama
speak	toki
eat	moku
drink	moku
sleep	lape
live	lon
become	kama

toki pona Verbs 17 – 32

Verbs 17 – 32 (English)	nimi pali 17 – 32 (toki pona)
die	moli
leave	weka
stay	awen
return	kama sin
give	pana
take	kama jo
send	pana
make	pali
find	alasa
learn	kama sona
tell	toki
think	toki insa
believe	pilin
understand	sona
remember	awen sona
must	wile

toki pona Verbs 33 – 48

Verbs 33 – 48 (English)	nimi pali 33 – 48 (toki pona)
forget	weka sona
use	kepeken
need	wile
be able to (can)	ken
smile	pona uta
look	lukin
listen	kute
cost	mani
help	pana pona
cook	seli
love	olin
hope	wile
fear	pilin ike
cry	telo oko
drive	lawa e tomo tawa
sing	kalama musi

toki pona Verbs 49 – 64

Verbs 49 – 64 (English)	nimi pali 49 – 64 (toki pona)
walk	tawa
run	tawa wawa
play	musi
laugh	kalama musi
dance	tawa musi
swim	tawa telo
get	kama jo
read	lukin
open	open
close	pini
dream	sitelen lape
ask	wile sona
answer	toki
visit	tawa
feel	pilin
try	lukin

toki pona Verbs 65 – 82

Verbs 65 – 82 (English)	nimi pali 65 – 82 (toki pona)
shower	telo
wear	len
take off/remove	weka
put on (clothes)	len
buy	esun
put	pana
say	toki
hear	kute
sit	awen
stand	awen
turn	tawa sike
start	open
choose	wile
stop	pini
touch	luka
shout	toki wawa
write	sitelen
wash	telo

---

If you’re interested in learning some more toki pona, check out our post Where to Learn Toki Pona.