spielst

Spielst is the second-person singular present tense form of the German verb spielen, meaning “to play.” It is used with the informal pronoun du to describe something the listener is doing in the present. The base verb spielen has the full present-tense paradigm ich spiele, du spielst, er/sie/es spielt, wir spielen, ihr spielt, sie spielen.

Pronunciation: spielst is typically pronounced with a long [i] in the stem, resulting in something like [ʃpiːlst]. The form follows standard German verb conjugation patterns and is distinct from the other present forms such as spiele (ich), spielt (er/sie/es), and spielen (wir/Sie/sie).

Usage and examples: Du spielst heute Tennis. Du spielst gern Schach mit Freunden. In questions or negations you might hear: Spielst du oft Videospiele? Nein, ich spielst du nicht? (Note: the negation uses the same verb form with a negation particle.) In formal writing or speech, the second-person plural or formal address uses Sie spielen rather than du spielst.

Notes: Spielst is specific to informal address. For formal address, you use Sie spielen. The related forms show the regular German present tense conjugation of the verb spielen. The term itself does not denote a separate concept beyond this grammatical form and typical usage in sentences describing present playing activity.