1st person sním sníme
2nd person sníš sníte
3rd person sní snědí”

Both “jíst” and “sníst” in Czech mean “to eat,” but there is a subtle difference between them based on aspect:

• Jíst is imperfective—it refers to an ongoing or habitual action without focusing on its completion. For example, “Jím oběd.” (“I am eating lunch.”) emphasizes the process of eating.
• Sníst is perfective—it focuses on the completion of the action. For example, “Snědl jsem oběd.” (“I ate lunch.”) indicates that the act of eating is finished.

Imperfective verbs describe actions in progress, while perfective verbs describe completed actions. These distinctions are super important in Slavic languages like Czech.

The verbs jíst and sníst both translate to “to eat” in English, but they have different aspects:

• Jíst is an imperfective verb. This means it describes an ongoing action without a specific completion. It focuses on the process of eating.
• Sníst is a perfective verb derived from jíst. It describes a completed action of eating, often implying eating something entirely or finishing a meal.

Here’s an analogy in English:

• Jíst is like saying “to be eating.”
• Sníst is like saying “to eat up” or “to finish eating.”

Here are some examples to illustrate the difference:

• Jím oběd. (I am eating lunch.) – This describes the ongoing action of eating lunch.
• Sním ten koláč. (I will eat that cake.) – This implies that you will eat the entire cake.
• Co jsi jedl k snídani? (What did you eat for breakfast?) – Here, jedl refers to the general action of eating breakfast.
• Snědl jsem celou večeři. (I ate the whole dinner.) – Here, snědl indicates that the entire dinner was consumed.

Key takeaway:

Use jíst when you want to talk about the act of eating in general or an ongoing process. Use sníst when you want to emphasize the completion of eating something.

It’s also worth noting that the perfective verb sníst often refers to a future completed action when used in the present tense (just like other perfective verbs in Czech). For example, “Sním to hned.” (I will eat it right away.)

• Německo-český slovník (Deutsch-Tschechisch)