Bizarrely , exceptions are more common with common words . The less common or more technical the word , the fewer the exceptions . I mean , the most common verb in IndoEuropean ? languages is to be , and it can be entirely unique per conjugation I am , he is , you are , etc . Same with common words like gowentgone . However , when you get to less common words , they tend to be more regular because people wouldn ' t be able to remember the irregularities . On the other hand , various languages have different AREAS in which they have exceptions . English verbs are famous for this ~ 230 irregular verbs ! , but all of our gerunds end in ing which is relatively rare and regular . Meanwhile Irish only has 13 irregular verbs including to be , but there ' s exceptions to be found in certain words that don ' t lentite with certain contexts that would normally trigger it . Most irregularities could be broadly put into three categoriesarchaisms , borrowings , and phonological changesconstraints . Archaisms are relatively obvious common words , since they ' re common , don ' t change the same way as other words . RE to be . Borrowings , on the other hand , can be subtle or huge French and Welsh influence no doubt played a huge part in how screwed up English can be , but even small exceptions are exceptions . English does not make use of the vl sound naturally no particular constraint against it as far as I can tell , we love our v o i c e d f ricativeliquidapproximate clusters , it just never appeared in English words . Yet we added the name Vladimir with ease . That ' s an exception to our phonological constraints via borrowing . I ' m sure someone smarter than I could give you a better example here , though . Finally , phonological changesconstraints can be seen even here , in modern English . Take our numerals , like First , Second , Third , Fourth , Fifth , Sixth , Seventh , etc . , particularly the th endings after third . Certain contexts add an additional s to these words , which for the most part works , Sixths , Sevenths , Eighths . But the word Fifths is somewhat infamous for being a tad difficult to pronounce that fs ending . Many people , especially nonnatives , simplify it to fs . Over time , it becomes codified , and thus the exception is born see how it ties back into archaisms ? ~~ Note that if your native language is English , English has an unusually high number of exceptions PERIOD ~~ And that ' s the short version of what ' s up with linguistic exceptions ! No one else can tell you how to make yours , though .