Russian Word Order & Sentence Structure

Because Russian uses case endings to mark grammatical roles, word order is freer than in English. The default order is subject–verb–object (Я чита́ю кни́гу), but you can rearrange the elements to shift emphasis: Кни́гу я чита́ю puts focus on "the book"; Чита́ю я кни́гу puts focus on the action.

The general principle is "topic first, new information last" — what the listener already knows tends to come at the start of the sentence, and the focus of the message comes at the end. Getting comfortable with this is what makes the difference between technically-correct Russian and natural-sounding Russian.

RusDrills offers 300+ free interactive Russian grammar exercises with instant feedback, spaced repetition, and audio pronunciation.

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