The strongest characteristics of pi’el imperfects are the sh’va under the signal letter. As with other pi’el forms the middle root letter is doubled with a sh’va. When the middle root letter can’t be doubled, there are other compensations, but the sh’va under the signal letter is constant. The vowel on the first root letter is normally patakh.

Because their middle root letter can’t be doubled, empty ע roots are not conjugated in pi’el. Instead, a variant binyan called polel takes the place of pi’el for those roots. In polel, the middle root letter becomes a vowel kholam, and the third root letter appears twice.