When the foreign students are leaning the complement in Chinese language, they must have known some basic knowledge about the result complement and the potential complement. However, after they learned these two types of complements, they may feel confused about the application just like hard to tell apart 能吃完 and 吃得完. As a matter of fact, the structure 能 + 动词 + result complement is almost the same with the affirmative form of potential complement in meaning and application.

Both complements can be applied to indicate that somebody has the ability or condition to finish something. But there are still some tiny differences that learners need to pay attention to when they study in Mandarin learning courses. From the view of meaning, when we use the pattern 能 + 动词 + result complement , the possibility is larger than using verb + 得… , with more affirmative tone .

Let’s take two examples to illustrate. The answer for the question 今天你能干完吗is 能干完while that for 今天你干得完吗should be 干得完. But in some cases, the meanings of both patterns are totally different. When we say 这种东西不能放进去, we mean this thing is not allowed to be put in. If we say 这东西太大了，放不进去, it means there is no condition for putting the thing in.

Another difference that the teachers in Chinese language school often remind you should be the structure. Sometimes, there are some other elements in the sentences and the structure 能 + 动词 + result complement can be replaced by potential complement. In addition, one point need to be mastered is that the objects should be placed after the potential complements if they appear at the same time like 外面太吵，吵得我看不下去书.

If the objects are the specific nouns very long, they should be placed at the beginning of the sentence like 我们老师和那个人的对话我听不懂. The rule is also the same when it comes to the separable nouns with potential complement like 我喝了咖啡就睡不着觉.