Object pronouns: mich, mir, ihn and ihm

A pronoun replaces a person or thing already identified. Its form depends on the German verb or preposition: sehen takes accusative, helfen takes dative. Do not choose the case from the English translation alone.

First identify the referent, then the case: der Gast becomes ihn after sehen and ihm after helfen. Die Kollegin becomes sie in accusative and ihr in dative. A pronoun referring to das Paket is es in accusative, even though English also uses “it” for nouns of other German genders.

Learn useful combinations: jemanden anrufen, jemandem helfen, jemandem danken, jemandem gehören. A preposition also determines case: für Sie uses accusative; mit Ihnen uses dative. Capitalise the formal address Sie and Ihnen.

With two unstressed object pronouns, accusative normally comes before dative: Ich gebe es ihr. This is a neutral-order guideline, not a claim that every context has exactly one possible word order. Do not transfer the usual order of two noun phrases mechanically to two pronouns.

Uns and euch have the same form in accusative and dative. Sie can mean “her”, “them” or formal “you” according to spelling and context. Always read the preceding sentence: these exercises explicitly identify the person or object.

Examples