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# 26. Questions

**On this page**

1. [1. Overview: question types](#1-overview-question-types)
2. [2. Polar questions by intonation](#2-polar-questions-by-intonation)
3. [3. Polar questions with *чи*](#3-polar-questions-with-чи)
4. [4. Biased and emotional polar questions](#4-biased-and-emotional-polar-questions)
5. [5. Alternative questions](#5-alternative-questions)
6. [6. Wh-questions: the question words](#6-wh-questions-the-question-words)
7. [7. Word order in wh-questions](#7-word-order-in-wh-questions)
8. [8. Infinitival and verbless questions](#8-infinitival-and-verbless-questions)
9. [9. Indirect questions](#9-indirect-questions)
10. [10. Tag questions](#10-tag-questions)
11. [11. Answers](#11-answers)
12. [12. Rhetorical questions and questions as requests](#12-rhetorical-questions-and-questions-as-requests)
13. [13. Variation: speech, region and contact as a delta over the standard](#13-variation-speech-region-and-contact-as-a-delta-over-the-standard)
14. [14. Punctuation](#14-punctuation)
15. [15. Counts in the treebanks and in news](#15-counts-in-the-treebanks-and-in-news)
16. [16. Quick reference: questions in UD](#16-quick-reference-questions-in-ud)
17. [17. How Mova handles it](#17-how-mova-handles-it)
18. [18. Sources](#18-sources)

A Ukrainian question keeps the word order of a statement. There is no inversion and no auxiliary: a yes/no question is made by intonation alone (*Ти прийдеш?* (*Ty pryidesh?*) 'Will you come?'), or by an initial particle, above all *чи* (*chy*) (*Чи ти прийдеш?*), with *хіба* (*khiba*), *невже* (*nevzhe*), *а*, *що* and others adding surprise, doubt or an expected answer. A wh-question puts the question word first, usually followed by the verb. Indirect yes/no questions are introduced by *чи* 'whether', never by *якщо* 'if'. Tag questions (*так?*, *правда?*, *еге ж?*) are frequent in speech, and the answers *так*/*ні* and the echo answer that repeats the verb (*Прийдеш? — Прийду.*) complete the system. This chapter describes the forms, their meanings and their frequency in written and spoken Ukrainian, and what Mova does with them.

Contents:

1. Overview: question types
2. Polar questions by intonation
3. Polar questions with *чи*
4. Biased and emotional polar questions: *хіба*, *невже*, *чи не*, *а*, *що*, *може*
5. Alternative questions
6. Wh-questions: the question words
7. Word order in wh-questions
8. Infinitival and verbless questions
9. Indirect questions
10. Tag questions
11. Answers
12. Rhetorical questions and questions as requests
13. Variation: speech, region and contact as a delta over the standard
14. Punctuation
15. Counts in the treebanks and in news
16. Quick reference: questions in UD
17. How Mova handles it
18. Sources

Related chapters: intonation in [3. Syllable, stress and intonation](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/uk/03-syllable-stress-intonation/); the pronouns *хто*, *що*, *який*, *чий* in [12. Pronouns, determiners and numerals](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/uk/12-pronouns-determiners-numerals/); the same words as relatives in [25. Relative clauses](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/uk/25-relative-clauses/); *чи* as 'or' in [24. Coordination and subordination](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/uk/24-coordination-subordination/); negative questions in [27. Negation](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/uk/27-negation/); focus and word order in [29. Ellipsis, word order and information structure](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/uk/29-ellipsis-word-order-information-structure/); questions as speech acts in [31. Speech acts](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/uk/31-speech-acts/); politeness in requests in [32. Politeness and hedging](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/uk/32-politeness-and-hedging/); particles in dialogue in [38. Dialogue and discourse markers](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/uk/38-dialogue-and-discourse-markers/).

---

## 1. Overview: question types

| type | marker | example | gloss |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| polar, intonation | rising pitch on the focus | *Ти прийдеш?* | 'Will you come?' |
| polar, particle | *чи* first | *Чи ти прийдеш?* | 'Will you come?' (more formal, more insistent) |
| biased polar | *хіба*, *невже*, *чи не*, *а*, *що*, *може* | *Невже ти не знав?* | 'Didn't you really know?' |
| alternative | *чи* 'or' | *Ти підеш чи залишишся?* | 'Will you go or stay?' |
| wh | question word first | *Куди ти йдеш?* | 'Where are you going?' |
| infinitival | wh-word or *чи* + infinitive | *Що робити?* | 'What is to be done?' |
| indirect | *чи*, wh-word | *Не знаю, чи він прийде.* | 'I don't know whether he will come.' |
| tag | *так?*, *правда?*, *еге ж?*, *чи не так?* | *Ти прийдеш, правда?* | 'You'll come, won't you?' |
| echo | the repeated word, high pitch | *Куди? Додому?* | 'Where? Home?' |
| rhetorical | any form, no answer expected | *Хто ж цього не знає?* | 'Who doesn't know that?' |

None of these changes the order of subject and verb. Smal-Stockyj (1913, § 62) notes for German readers that Ukrainian lacks the obligatory inversion of the independent question: *Як же ви тут живете?* 'How do you live here?' keeps *ви* before the verb.

---

## 2. Polar questions by intonation

### 2.1 Form

The plain yes/no question is a declarative sentence with question intonation: a sharp rise on the stressed syllable of the word in question, followed by a fall or a low level tail. The word that carries the rise is the **focus** of the question; moving the rise changes what is asked:

| sentence | rise on | what is asked |
| --- | --- | --- |
| *Ти **прийдеш** завтра?* | the verb | whether you will come at all |
| ***Ти** прийдеш завтра?* | the subject | whether it's you who will come |
| *Ти прийдеш **завтра**?* | the adverb | whether it will be tomorrow |

The focused word can also be moved to the front to reinforce the focus: *Завтра ти прийдеш?* The intonation itself is described in [chapter 3](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/uk/03-syllable-stress-intonation/); in writing only the question mark shows it.

### 2.2 Subject drop

The subject pronoun is often dropped, since the verb ending shows the person: *Прийдеш?* 'Will you come?'; *Наполягаєте?* 'Do you insist?' A one-word question of this kind is the commonest polar question of conversation. The parliamentary transcripts are full of them, from the chair: *Готові голосувати?* 'Ready to vote?' (ParlaMint-UA_2022-01-25-m0.u120.p4.lang1.s2); *Домовились?* 'Agreed?' (ParlaMint-UA_2022-01-25-m0.u197.p10.lang1.s2).

### 2.3 Frequency

In the spoken treebank, questions without any question word or particle are the majority: of the 372 ParlaMint sentences containing a question mark, 216 (58%) have neither a non-coordinating *чи* nor an interrogative pronoun or adverb; in the written IU the share is 99 of 266 (37%). (Counts on all splits, UD 2.18, 2026-11-06; a "neither" sentence is mostly an intonation question, but also a tag question, a verbless echo or a question mark inside a quotation.)

---

## 3. Polar questions with *чи*

### 3.1 Form and meaning

*Чи* (*chy*) stands first in the clause and leaves the order unchanged: *Чи ти знаєш?* 'Do you know?'; *Чи можна це зробити?* 'Can this be done?' (ParlaMint-UA_2014-03-04-m0.u99.p2.lang1.s2). It is unstressed and may be followed by other particles (*чи ж*, *чи то*, *чи не*).

What *чи* adds is not grammaticality (the question is complete without it) but **explicitness**: it marks the sentence as a question from its first word, which suits writing, formal speech, questionnaires and headlines (*Чи є життя на Марсі?*). Smal-Stockyj (1913, § 58) describes it as giving an independent question "more emphasis" (*mehr Nachdruck*), and in conversation a *чи*-question often does sound more insistent or more deliberate than a bare intonation question. The pattern is old and shared with other Slavic languages (Polish *czy*); it is not a borrowing and needs no stylistic apology.

### 3.2 Frequency

In written news, *чи*-questions are a minority: in the 2024 Leipzig news sample (1 million sentences), 10,578 sentences end with a question mark and 1,261 (12%) of them begin with *Чи* (2026-11-06). In ParlaMint, 22 sentences begin with *Чи*; IU has 45 question sentences with a non-coordinating *чи* (some of them indirect questions inside a direct one).

### 3.3 *Чи* in UD

The two treebanks tag initial question *чи* as PART with the relation `discourse` (ParlaMint: 38 tokens; IU: 58); the subordinating *чи* of indirect questions is `mark` (SCONJ or CCONJ by treebank; §9); the 'or' of alternatives is CCONJ `cc` (IU 147, ParlaMint 114).

---

## 4. Biased and emotional polar questions

Several particles make a polar question express an attitude: surprise, disbelief, an expected answer, a suggestion.

| particle | meaning | example | gloss |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| *хіба* (*khiba*) | the speaker doubts or contests the proposition; often expects 'no' (with a negative verb, 'yes') | *Хіба це правда?* / *Хіба ти не знав?* | 'Is that really true?' / 'Didn't you know?' (you surely did) |
| *невже* (*nevzhe*) | surprise, disbelief at new evidence | *Невже він приїхав?* | 'Has he really come?' |
| *чи не* | a suggestion or an expected 'yes' | *Чи не піти нам додому?* / *Чи не настав час…?* | 'Shouldn't we go home?' / 'Hasn't the time come…?' |
| *а* | a new topic or a follow-up | *А ти?* / *А де мама?* | 'And you?' / 'And where's mum?' |
| *що*, *що ж* | an introducing 'well, so' | *Що, не чекав?* | 'What, didn't expect it?' |
| *може*, *мабуть* | a tentative suggestion | *Може, не будемо ставити?* | 'Maybe we won't put it (to a vote)?' |
| *та* | impatient disbelief, colloquial | *Та невже?* | 'You don't say!' |
| *ну* | impatience, prompting | *Ну що, підемо?* | 'Well, shall we go?' |

*Хіба* also has an older and dialect meaning 'except, unless' after a negation (*Там нема нікого, хіба одна баба* 'There's nobody there but one old woman'), which Smerechynskyi (1932, ch. XXVII, type 8) treats among the negative constructions of the folk language; the question use (*Хіба ж тобі краще чужа сторона?*, a folk song he cites there) is the one current everywhere.

*Невже* combines easily with negation: *Невже не можна зробити адекватний порядок денний для країни?* 'Is it really impossible to make a proper agenda for the country?' (ParlaMint-UA_2022-01-25-m0.u74.p1.lang1.s3). With negation, a *невже*- or *хіба*-question asserts the positive: the speaker believes it can be done.

*Чи не* deserves care: *Чи не прийшов він?* can be a neutral, polite question ('Has he come, by any chance?') or a biased one ('Hasn't he come?'), and the *не* is not a real negation; the 'yes' answer confirms the positive (*Так, прийшов*). The parliamentary example *Чи не настав час позбавитися такого явища…?* 'Isn't it time to get rid of such a phenomenon…?' (ParlaMint-UA_2003-10-14-m0.u40.p1.lang1.s5) is the rhetorical type (§12). In UD the *не* is still `advmod` (IU) or `advmod:neg` (ParlaMint) with `Polarity=Neg`: the annotation does not see the expletive reading.

The question particles are pragmatic markers as much as syntactic ones; their dialogue functions are in [chapter 38](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/uk/38-dialogue-and-discourse-markers/).

---

## 5. Alternative questions

An alternative question joins the options with *чи* 'or' (not *або*, which is 'or' in statements): *Ти підеш чи залишишся?* 'Will you go or stay?'; *Чай чи каву?* 'Tea or coffee?'. The first option may also be introduced by *чи*: *Чи ти підеш, чи залишишся?*. The yes-or-no alternative is *… чи ні?*: *Ти прийдеш чи ні?*; *Так чи ні?* 'Yes or no?' (ParlaMint-UA_2022-01-25-m0.u112.p1.lang1.s5). Smal-Stockyj (1913, § 60) gives *чи* as the "or" of two-part questions: *Будеш слухати, чи ні?* 'Will you obey or not?'.

The same *чи … чи* appears in statements of alternative 'whether … or': *Чи дощ, чи сніг — ми йдемо* 'Rain or snow, we're going'; this is a correlative conjunction ([chapter 24](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/uk/24-coordination-subordination/)).

---

## 6. Wh-questions: the question words

### 6.1 Inventory

| word | meaning | declension / forms | example |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| *хто* | who | *кого, кому, ким, (на) кому/кім* | *Хто там?* 'Who's there?'; *Кому ти дзвонив?* 'Whom did you call?' |
| *що* | what | *чого, чому, чим, (на) чому/чім* | *Що сталося?* 'What happened?'; *Чим ти пишеш?* 'What are you writing with?' |
| *який* | which, what kind | adjectival, agrees | *Яку книжку ти читаєш?* 'Which book are you reading?' |
| *котрий* | which (of several); what number | adjectival | *Котра година?* 'What time is it?' |
| *чий* | whose | adjectival, agrees with the possessed | *Чия це сумка?* 'Whose bag is this?' |
| *де* | where | — | *Де ти живеш?* |
| *куди* | where to | — | *Куди ти йдеш?* |
| *звідки* | where from | — | *Звідки ви?* 'Where are you from?' |
| *коли* | when | — | *Коли почнемо?* |
| *відколи*, *доки*, *до коли* | since when, until when | — | *Відколи ти тут?* |
| *чому* | why (cause) | — | *Чому ти мовчиш?* |
| *навіщо*, *нащо* | what for (purpose) | — | *Навіщо тобі це?* |
| *чого* | why (colloquial) | the genitive of *що* | *Чого ти плачеш?* 'Why are you crying?' |
| *як* | how | — | *Як справи?* 'How are things?' |
| *скільки* | how much, how many | *скількох, скільком, скількома* | *Скільки це коштує?*; *Скільки тобі років?* |
| *який* (exclamative) | what (a) | — | *Який гарний день!* (not a question) |

The distinction between *чому* 'why, for what reason' and *навіщо* 'what for, for what purpose' is real and is kept in careful speech: *Чому ти прийшов?* asks for a cause, *Навіщо ти прийшов?* for a purpose (and can sound like a reproach). *Чого* 'why' is the colloquial general word, frequent in speech and in fiction; the treebank count of interrogative *чого* (15 in IU) includes both 'why' and the genitive 'of what'.

*Що* + genitive asks for a kind: *Що це за людина?* 'What kind of person is that?' (*що за* + nominative, a calque-like construction that is fully established), *Що нового?* 'What's new?' (partitive genitive).

### 6.2 Case and prepositions

The question word takes the case of its role and any preposition precedes it: *З ким ти говорив?* 'Who did you talk to?'; *Про що цей закон?* 'What is this law about?'; *Для кого ми це вдосконалюємо?* 'For whom are we improving this?' (ParlaMint-UA_2022-01-25-m0.u110.p2.lang1.s1, with *І* first). A preposition is never stranded. With *який* and *чий*, the whole noun phrase moves: *Якого роду коригування?* 'What kind of adjustment?' (ParlaMint-UA_2022-01-25-m0.u106.p2.lang1.s1).

### 6.3 Agreement

*Хто* takes a masculine singular verb even when it asks about a woman or about many people: *Хто прийшов?* 'Who has come?', not *✗ Хто прийшла?*; agreement with a known female referent occurs in colloquial speech but is not the norm. *Що* takes a neuter singular: *Що сталося?*

---

## 7. Word order in wh-questions

### 7.1 The default

The question word stands first, after any coordinating conjunction, particle (*а*, *і*, *ну*) or address. The subject follows or precedes the verb according to its information status:

- *Куди ти йдеш?* (pronoun subject before the verb: unmarked);
- *Куди йде цей потяг?* (noun subject after the verb: unmarked when it is part of the rheme);
- *Що сказав президент?* — *Що президент сказав?* (both natural; the second treats *президент* as a given topic).

### 7.2 Topics and addresses before the question word

A topic or an address may precede the question word: *Шановні колеги, про що цей закон?* 'Dear colleagues, what is this law about?' (ParlaMint-UA_2022-01-25-m0.u106.p1.lang1.s1); *А ти куди?* 'And where are you going?' (with the topic *ти* first and the verb dropped); *Цей закон про що?* 'This law — what is it about?' The last order, with the question word late, is colloquial; a question word at the very end is the echo question (*Ти поїдеш куди?* 'You'll go where?').

Counts (UD 2.18, 2026-11-06; sentences ending with a question mark that contain an interrogative pronoun or adverb): in IU 123 such sentences, of which 61 have the question word first (after an optional conjunction, particle or preposition) and 21 have a comma before it (an address, a topic or a preceding clause); in ParlaMint 129, of which 89 first and 27 after a comma. A question word as the last word before the question mark occurs 5 times in IU and not at all in ParlaMint.

### 7.3 Multiple wh-questions

Several question words can co-occur, all at the front, usually in the order subject — object — oblique: *Хто що сказав?* 'Who said what?'; *Хто кому що винен?* 'Who owes what to whom?'; *Коли і де це було?* 'When and where was it?' (the last with coordination).

### 7.4 Questions inside clauses

A question word cannot be extracted out of a finite subordinate clause in the written standard (*✗ Кого ти думаєш, що він бачив?*); speech uses a parenthetical (*Кого, ти думаєш, він бачив?*) or a different construction (*Як ти думаєш, кого він бачив?* 'Who do you think he saw?' — literally 'How do you think, whom did he see?', the normal Ukrainian phrasing).

---

## 8. Infinitival and verbless questions

### 8.1 With the infinitive

A question with an infinitive and no finite verb asks what is to be done, with the doer, if named, in the dative:

- *Що робити?* 'What is to be done? / What should I do?';
- *Куди йти?* 'Where to go?';
- *Кому вірити?* 'Whom to trust?';
- *Чи варто чекати?* 'Is it worth waiting?';
- *Мені піти?* 'Shall I go?' (dative subject).

These are the Ukrainian equivalents of English *should/shall* questions. In UD the infinitive is the root (`VerbForm=Inf`), the dative is `iobj` or `obl` by treebank.

### 8.2 Without a verb

Verbless questions are normal with a zero copula and with ellipsis: *Хто там?*; *Звідки ви?*; *Який номер?* 'What number?' (ParlaMint-UA_2022-01-25-m0.u181.p17.lang3.s1); *А ви і від комітету?* 'And you (speak) for the committee as well?' (ParlaMint-UA_2022-01-25-m0.u101.p1.lang1.s1). See [chapter 29](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/uk/29-ellipsis-word-order-information-structure/) for the analysis of such fragments.

---

## 9. Indirect questions

### 9.1 Yes/no: *чи*

An embedded yes/no question is introduced by *чи* 'whether', in first position of the clause: *Я не знаю, чи він прийде* 'I don't know whether he will come'; *Спитай, чи можна* 'Ask whether it's allowed'; *Невідомо, чи вони погодяться* 'It's unknown whether they'll agree'. The alternative is *чи … чи ні*: *Не знаю, прийде він чи ні.*

The English *if* in this function is never *якщо* or *коли*: *✗ Я не знаю, якщо він прийде* is an error of translation from English (or of contact with Russian *если*), and style guides list it among the commonest. *Якщо* is conditional only ([chapter 24](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/uk/24-coordination-subordination/)).

### 9.2 Wh: the question word

An embedded wh-question uses the question word as a connector: *Скажи, де ти був* 'Tell me where you were'; *Я не розумію, чому він мовчить*; *Подивись, хто прийшов*. Embedded multiple questions are possible: *Ми не знаємо, хто кому що сказав.*

The verb of the embedded question keeps the tense of direct speech (no sequence of tenses): *Він спитав, чи я прийду* 'He asked whether I would come' (lit. 'whether I will come'). See [chapter 24](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/uk/24-coordination-subordination/) on reported speech.

### 9.3 Punctuation and the main clause

The indirect question ends with a full stop, not a question mark, unless the main clause itself is a question (2019 orthography, § 156, note 1): *Питав мене, чого зайшла* — but *Чи знаєте, як високо сокіл під небом літає?* The comma before *чи* and the question word is obligatory.

### 9.4 In UD

The indirect question is `ccomp` of the verb of saying or knowing; *чи* is `mark` (IU 16 as SCONJ, 1 CCONJ; ParlaMint 10 SCONJ, 7 CCONJ, 1 PART), and a question word keeps its own relation inside the clause (`obj`, `advmod`…) with `PronType=Int`.

---

## 10. Tag questions

A statement is turned into a request for confirmation by a short tag after a comma. The tags differ in register:

| tag | register | example |
| --- | --- | --- |
| *так?* | neutral, spoken | *Ти завтра будеш, так?* |
| *правда?*, *чи не правда?* | neutral | *Гарно тут, правда?* |
| *чи не так?* | formal | *Це головне, чи не так?* |
| *еге ж?*, *еге?* | colloquial, rural and literary | *Ти з Полтави, еге ж?* |
| *хіба ні?* | argumentative | *Ти ж сам це казав, хіба ні?* |
| *ні?* | after a positive statement, 'or not?' | *Підемо разом, ні?* |
| *да?* | contact form (see §13) | *Є, да?* |
| *ага?* | colloquial | *Ти прийдеш, ага?* |

After a negative statement the tag confirms the negative: *Ніхто не наполягає, так?* 'Nobody insists, right?' (ParlaMint-UA_2022-01-25-m0.u191.p7.lang1.s3); *Не наполягаєте, так?* 'You don't insist, right?' (ParlaMint-UA_2022-01-25-m0.u136.p2.lang1.s3).

In ParlaMint, sentence-final tags after a comma occur 14 times: *, так?* 7, *, да?* 5, *, ні?* 2 (all splits, 2026-11-06). The use of Russian-origin *да?* by the chair in the 2022 sessions (*Михайла Віталійовича немає, да?* 'Mykhailo Vitaliiovych isn't here, right?', ParlaMint-UA_2022-01-25-m0.u116.p2.lang1.s1; *Чотири хвилини, Микита Русланович, да?* 'Four minutes, Mykyta Ruslanovych, right?', ParlaMint-UA_2022-01-25-m0.u138.p6.lang1.s4) shows how spoken parliamentary Ukrainian keeps contact features that edited text removes; the second example also has a nominative address where the standard requires the vocative *Микито Руслановичу* (see [chapter 32](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/uk/32-politeness-and-hedging/)).

---

## 11. Answers

### 11.1 *Так* and *ні*

The answer particles are *так* 'yes' and *ні* 'no'. *Ні* is the stressed, free-standing negative; *не* is the unstressed negation of a word (Smal-Stockyj 1913, § 58, compares the pair to French *non* : *ne*): *Чи так, чи ні? — Ні, не так.* 'Is it so or not? — No, not so.'

Emphatic affirmatives: *авжеж*, *атож*, *аякже* 'of course', written as one word (2019 orthography, § 44, 2.2); *звісно*, *звичайно*, *безумовно*; colloquial *ага*, *еге*. Emphatic negatives: *та ні*, *аж ніяк* 'not at all', *нізащо* 'not for anything'.

### 11.2 The echo answer

Ukrainian often answers a polar question by repeating the verb (or the focused word), with or without *так*/*ні*:

- *Прийдеш? — Прийду.* 'Will you come? — I will.'
- *Ти був там? — Був.* 'Were you there? — I was.'
- *Ти це бачив? — Не бачив.* 'Did you see it? — I didn't.'
- *Завтра? — Завтра.* 'Tomorrow? — Tomorrow.'

The echo answer is neutral and frequent in conversation and literature; a bare *так* can sound curt by comparison.

### 11.3 Answers to negative questions

After a negative question, *так* agrees with the negative proposition and *ні* contradicts it, but the system is unstable and speakers add the verb to avoid ambiguity: *Ти не прийдеш? — Ні, прийду* 'You won't come? — Yes, I will' (contradicting); *— Так, не прийду* or *— Ні, не прийду* 'No, I won't' (confirming; both occur). The safe answer is the echo with the polarity spelled out: *Прийду* / *Не прийду*.

---

## 12. Rhetorical questions and questions as requests

### 12.1 Rhetorical questions

A rhetorical question has the form of a question and the force of an assertion of the opposite polarity, and is often marked by *ж*/*же*, *хіба*, *невже*, *чи не*, or by a negation:

- *Хто ж цього не знає?* = 'Everyone knows it.'
- *Хіба ж тобі краще чужа сторона?* = 'A foreign land is not better for you.' (folk song, cited by Smerechynskyi 1932, ch. XXVII)
- *Що ж тут скажеш?* = 'There's nothing to say.'
- *Чи не настав час…?* = 'It is time…' (§4)

Political speech uses them as a matter of course; the parliamentary questions *Хто з цим не впорався?* 'Who failed to cope with it?' (ParlaMint-UA_2022-01-25-m0.u172.p2.lang1.s5) and *Чому ми ще на рік переносимо?* 'Why are we postponing for another year?' (…s6) are accusations, not requests for information. The 2019 orthography allows *??* and *?!* for heightened question intonation (§ 156, notes 2–3).

### 12.2 Questions as requests

Polite requests are commonly phrased as questions about ability or permission: *Можна вас попросити…?*; *Ви не могли б…?* 'Could you…?' (with a negative and the conditional, the most polite); *Чи не могли б ви…?*; *Дайте, будь ласка…* is the imperative alternative. See [chapters 31](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/uk/31-speech-acts/) and [32](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/uk/32-politeness-and-hedging/).

---

## 13. Variation: speech, region and contact as a delta over the standard

The grammar of questions is the same across varieties; the differences are in a handful of words and in prosody. The table lists them as changes against the literary standard.

| variety / style | delta over the standard | example (variety) | standard |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| colloquial (all regions) | intonation questions preferred over *чи*; subject dropped; *чого* for *чому*; *нащо* for *навіщо* | *Чого мовчиш?* | *Чому ти мовчиш?* |
| colloquial (all regions) | verbless questions with *а* | *А ти?*, *А мама де?* | *А як щодо тебе?* |
| eastern and southern speech, much urban speech | *шо* for *що* (pronunciation, also written in dialogue) | *Шо там?* | *Що там?* |
| surzhyk | answer particle *да* for *так*; tag *да?* | *Да, прийду.*; *Є, да?* | *Так, прийду.*; *Є, так?* |
| poetry and folk song | *чом* for *чому*; question with *ой* | *Чом ти не прийшов?* | *Чому ти не прийшов?* |
| official writing | *чи* + full clause; no tags | *Чи погоджуєтеся Ви з…?* | — |

Notes on the entries:

- Hentschel (2023, `hentschel-2023-surzhyk-lexicon`), working on a large field corpus of surzhyk from central Ukraine and the Black Sea coast, finds that the affirmative reply particle *da* is used almost consistently in surzhyk where standard Ukrainian has *tak*, as in Russian; he adds that *da* also occurs in central Ukrainian dialects, which may have helped its adoption. The parliamentary *да?* of §10 fits this picture: it appears in spontaneous speech of speakers otherwise using standard Ukrainian.
- *Шо* is a widespread colloquial pronunciation, strongest in the east and south; on its own it does not mark surzhyk (it occurs once as a lemma in IU).
- Dialect question forms are left to the varieties chapter ([chapter 8](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/uk/08-national-varieties/)); the treebanks contain no dialect questions to count.

---

## 14. Punctuation

- A direct question ends with a question mark; a question inside a sentence (a parenthetical question) also takes one: *…то в управі так шмагали, що — вірите? — шкура полопалася* (2019 orthography, § 156, 2; the example there is from Honchar).
- An indirect question takes no question mark (§9.3).
- *?!* marks a question with exclamation, *??* or *???* a heightened question (§ 156, notes 2–3).
- Tags are separated by a comma: *Ти прийдеш, правда?*
- The particle *чи* is not followed by a comma (*Чи ти прийдеш?*), but *може*, *мабуть* as parentheticals are: *Може, не будемо ставити?* (ParlaMint-UA_2022-01-25-m0.u132.p1.lang1.s2).

---

## 15. Counts in the treebanks and in news

UD 2.18, all splits, counted with `awk` over the CoNLL-U files, 2026-11-06. A "question sentence" is a sentence whose `# text` contains a question mark.

| measure | IU | ParlaMint |
| --- | --- | --- |
| question sentences | 266 | 372 |
| with a non-coordinating *чи* | 45 | 27 |
| with an interrogative word, no *чи* | 122 | 129 |
| with neither (intonation, tags, fragments) | 99 | 216 |
| beginning with *що* (any use) | 18 | 24 |
| beginning with *а* | 18 | 14 |
| beginning with *хіба* / *невже* | 1 / 1 | 1 / 1 |

Interrogative words (`PronType=Int`, all sentences): IU *що* 65, *хто* 26, *як* 23, *чого* 15, *який* 14, *чому* 11, *навіщо* 5, *коли* 5, *де* 5, *куди* 4, *звідки* 3, *чом* 2, *скільки* 2, *шо* 1; ParlaMint *що* 54, *чому* 31, *як* 20, *хто* 20, *який* 14, *де* 10, *навіщо* 4, *чого* 2, *скільки* 2, *коли* 2.

The difference in *чому* (11 vs 31) and *чого* (15 vs 2) is a register difference: parliamentary speech asks "why" in the standard word, fiction and dialogue in the colloquial one.

Leipzig news 2024 (1M sentences, CC BY): 10,578 sentences end with a question mark; 1,261 begin with *Чи*; the word *хіба* occurs 363 times and *невже* 76 times in the whole sample.

---

## 16. Quick reference: questions in UD

| construction | example | analysis |
| --- | --- | --- |
| intonation question | *Ти прийдеш?* | no marker; `punct(прийдеш, ?)` |
| *чи*-question | *Чи можна це зробити?* | `discourse(можна, Чи)`, PART |
| biased particle | *Невже він приїхав?* | `advmod` or `discourse` of the predicate (*невже* PART) |
| wh-word | *Куди ти йдеш?* | `advmod(йдеш, Куди)`, ADV `PronType=Int` |
| wh-pronoun with preposition | *З ким ти говорив?* | `obl(говорив, ким)`, `case(ким, З)`, PRON `PronType=Int` |
| *що за* | *Що це за людина?* | treebank-specific; *що* PRON, *за* ADP `case` or `fixed` |
| infinitival | *Що робити?* | `root` = *робити* (`VerbForm=Inf`), `obj(робити, Що)` |
| alternative | *Чай чи каву?* | `conj(Чай, каву)`, `cc(каву, чи)` |
| indirect yes/no | *Не знаю, чи він прийде.* | `ccomp(знаю, прийде)`, `mark(прийде, чи)` |
| indirect wh | *Скажи, де ти був.* | `ccomp(Скажи, був)`, `advmod(був, де)` `PronType=Int` |
| tag | *…, так?* | `discourse` or `parataxis` of the main predicate |
| answer particle | *Так, прийду.* | `discourse(прийду, Так)` |

---

## 17. How Mova handles it

### 17.1 The fact extractor rejects questions

The Ukrainian fact extractor in [`kg/src/uk.rs`](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/kg/) checks punctuation before anything else: a question mark rejects the sentence as `question` (`Reject::Question`), as [kg — the Mova knowledge graph](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/kg/) lists it among the constructions that "are not yet simple sentences". Independently, the words *чи*, *хто*, *що*, *який*, *чий*, *котрий*, *де*, *куди*, *коли*, *чому*, *навіщо*, *звідки*, *як* are on the `CONJ` list, so an indirect question is rejected as `conjunction` even without a question mark.

Measured with `kg parse` (CPU, worktree at commit `ac9a23149`, VESUM, empty proper-name list; 2026-11-06):

| sentence | result |
| --- | --- |
| *Чи ти прийдеш?* | rejected: question |
| *Ти прийдеш?* | rejected: question |
| *Хіба ти не знав?* | rejected: question |
| *Де ти живеш?* | rejected: question |
| *Ти прийдеш завтра.* (control) | parsed: `predicate→прийти` (future, perfective, 2nd person), `subject→ти`, `adverbial→завтра` |

The control shows that the same words in a statement are read; the question mark alone decides. An intonation question written without a question mark (as in some transcripts) would be read as a statement, which is the one way the gate can be wrong.

### 17.2 Questions in Mova's pragmatics

Mova's pragmatic sentence labels ([`prag/src/schema.rs`](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/prag/)) include the sentence form (`decl`, `q`, `wh`, `imp`, `excl`, `frag`, `intj`, `other`) and the act, with indirect requests marked; all labellers and witnesses behind them read English. Nothing labels a Ukrainian sentence's form, distinguishes a *хіба*-question from an information question, or reads a rhetorical question as an assertion.

### 17.3 Not yet

- No Ukrainian parser (no model in `tools/mova-parse`; `langseg` has no Cyrillic table) and no Ukrainian UD baseline in [What every language gets](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/PACKAGE/), as of 2026-11-06.
- No question-to-fact mapping (a polar question as a fact with an open truth value, a wh-question as a fact with an open member), though the `kg` fact format could represent an open member as it represents the implicit subject (`ø`).
- No reading of question particles or tags, no answer resolution (*Прийдеш? — Прийду.*), no detection of the contact tag *да?* as a register signal.
- The generator ([`kg/src/textgen.rs`](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/kg/)) produces declaratives only.

---

## 18. Sources

- Smal-Stockyj, Stephan. 1913. *Ruthenische Grammatik*. Berlin/Leipzig: Göschen. § 58 (*чи* in independent and dependent questions; *ні* vs *не*), § 60 (*чи* "or" in two-part questions), § 62 (no inversion in questions). `stockyj-1913-ruthenische-grammatik` (public domain).
- Smerechynskyi, Serhii. 1932. *Нариси з української синтакси*. Ch. XXVII (negative constructions; *хіба* after negation; the rhetorical *хіба*-question of folk song). `smerechynskyi-1932-narysy-z-ukrainskoi-syntaksy` (public domain in UA/EU).
- *Український правопис*. 2019. § 44 (writing of *авжеж, атож, аякже*), § 156 (question mark: indirect questions, *??*, *?!*). `ukrainskyi-pravopys-2019` (official document).
- Hentschel, Gerd. 2023. Ukrainian and Russian in the lexicon of Ukrainian Suržyk: reduced variation and stabilisation in central Ukraine and on the Black Sea coast. `hentschel-2023-surzhyk-lexicon` (CC BY 4.0).
- Shvedova, Maria, Arsenii Lukashevskyi, and Andriy Rysin. 2025. Developing a Universal Dependencies Treebank for Ukrainian Parliamentary Speech. UNLP 2025. `shvedova-2025-developing-universal-dependencies-treebank-ukrainian` (CC BY 4.0).
- UD Ukrainian ParlaMint 2.18 (CC BY-SA 4.0): sentences cited by `sent_id`; counts. UD Ukrainian IU 2.18 (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0): counts only. Leipzig Corpora Collection, Ukrainian news 2024 (CC BY): counts. All 2026-11-06.
- Mova: [`kg/src/uk.rs`](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/kg/), [`kg/src/textgen.rs`](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/kg/), [kg — the Mova knowledge graph](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/kg/), [`prag/src/schema.rs`](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/prag/), [What every language gets](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/PACKAGE/).
- [← previous 25. Relative clauses](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/uk/25-relative-clauses/)
- [next → 27. Negation](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/uk/27-negation/)
- [↑ back to Ukrainian: a reference manual for Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/languages/uk/)