Spanish Verb Tenses Explained

Spanish Verb Tenses Explained!

Spanish verb conjugation is often referred to as the most difficult aspect of learning Spanish as conjugation can be very complex and highly irregular in some cases. What often gets overlooked are the Spanish verb tenses themselves which is surprising as it is very important to understand when a tense is used, how it is used and when it is used.

Many students who have attacked the conjugation of Spanish verbs have done so without fully knowing about the various Spanish verb tenses they are conjugating in, this in itself, will not affect their ability to master verb conjugation but it does affect how they use their new skill. Hopefully the short glossary below will help to provide some necessary information about Spanish verb tenses:

Compound:
Compound tenses are the group of tenses that consist of more than one element. In the Spanish language, compound tenses are formed by using the auxiliary verb and the past participle, for example: ha contestado which means, ‘he has answered‘.

Past Participle:
The past participle is the form of a verb that indicates a past or completed action or time and is used after the auxiliary verb ‘to have‘ in English and ‘haber‘ in Spanish, for example: abierto - ‘opened‘ in he abierto – ‘I have opened‘

Subjunctive:
The subjunctive is not a tense, as many students believe, but a mood. Although it exists in English it goes almost unoticed as it almost always takes the same form as the indicative. However, in Spanish, it is widely used when expressing doubt, how a person feels about a possibe action, feelings, and a wish,ntent or command for a possible action.

Indicative:
As with the subjunctive the indicative is a mood. It is the most widely used mood and is used in ordinary, typical speech when making statements as in hablo - ‘I speak‘,  ha venido – ‘he has come‘, estoy probando – ‘I am trying‘

Present:
The present tense is where pretty much every student begins and for good reason, it is the most commonly used tense and is used to express an action that is currently being undertaken. hablo ‘I speak‘ or, ‘I am speaking‘

Imperfect:
One of two simple past tenses in Spanish. The imperative is used to express a past action that has not been completed, that occured frequently or that took place over an indefinite period of time eg. decía - ‘I was saying‘

Preterite:
The other simple past tense used to  express an action in the past which has been completed or occured over a definite period of time, eg; dije – ‘I said‘

Perfect:
Another past tense used to describe a completed past action. It comprises the auxiliary verb haber and the past participle, eg he visto – ‘I have seen‘

Pluperfect:
A past tense used to describe an action occurring in the past before another past action and is formed using the imperfect of haber and the past participle: había ido antes de que llegué – ‘he had gone before I arrived‘

Future:
One of the simpler tenses to understand, the future refers to an action that hasn’t happened yet but is expected: abriré mañana -  ‘I will open tomorrow‘

Present Participle or ‘Gerund’:
Not used too much apart from when attached to the verb estar - ‘to be‘ in the present continuous tense. It is the equivalent of the English verb form that ends in -ing for example; escribiendo ‘writing‘.

Present Continuous:
This tense is only used to describe actions that are actually taking place at the time of use, and is formed by using the present tense of the verb estar and the present participle: estoy escribiendo ‘I am writing‘

Conditional:
The conditional tense does not refer to a particular period of time unlike the past, present and future tenses but instead it is used, as it’s name suggests, when a condition is involved but in Spanish it is often linked to the future tense hence why it is known both as el condicional and el futuro hipotético (the hypothetical future).

In English the conditional would be formed by using the auxiliary verb would…for example: ‘I would wash if I were dirty‘, but in Spanish it is rendered by a single verb form, eg; cerraría ‘I would close‘

Imperative:
The imperative is a tense that is used when giving orders or suggestions..¡Escribe! - Write!

That should help you for the time being, however, should you need further information about any of the tenses above use the search facility at the top of this page and I am sure there will be a post on this blog somewhere that will be more than helpful.

However, if you are struggling with Spanish verb conjugation may I suggest checking out my verbarrator review. It’s a fantastic verb training program as my review explains and should you decide that it’s just what you need I’ll throw in my verb conjugation book called ‘2000+Spanish Irregular verbs‘ selling for $16 for FREE!

If you would like to read another post why not check out my previous post entitled 1001 Spanish Verbs it’s not quite as straightforward as it sounds!

1001 Spanish Verbs

1001 Spanish verbs was a program that you could download to your PC relatively cheaply and it provided the full conjugation for each of those verbs in the 12 most important tenses used in the Spanish language. Unfortunately, it is quite difficult to find this program for the PC nowadays and it now seems to be available for downloads to mobile phones only.

However, the question you should be asking is whether or not you actually need a program, or book, that provides the full conjugation for that number of verbs?

The simple answer to this question is ‘no’ and here is an explanation of why the answer is a negative. As you are no doubt aware, there are many thousands of regular verbs in Spanish, and these verbs fall into three groups. These three groups are comprised of verbs that end in either, -ar, -er or -ir.

Regular verbs are so-called because they follow exactly the same Spanish verb conjugation pattern as other verbs that use the same ending, this means you would only really need a full list of regular verbs and a single full conjugation sheet for each verb group in order to find the necessary form.

The only problem with Spanish, as with many other languages, are the high numbers of irregular Spanish verbs that there are…over 2000 to be precise! This, in itself, is enough to panic a Spanish language student especially as learning the conjugations of irregular Spanish verbs is considered the most difficult task when learning the language.

Two thousand seems an awfully large number of verbs with irregularities to learn and if you had to learn each one it would be, without a doubt, but when you consider first of all, that many of these verbs will be very rarely used, if at all, and secondly that these 2000 plus verbs can be further broken down into 66 or so different types of irregular patterns and the task appears much more doable!

So to recap…3 regular conjugation patterns and 66 irregular conjugation patterns, that is 69 different formations if my calculator is correct which is a long way from the 1001 Spanish verbs in the title. This being the case all you would need are the conjugation patterns for these 69 and lists containing regular -ar,-er and -ir verbs and irregular verbs for each irregularity.

The biggest problem that faces most, if not all, students of Spanish is that of actually learning verbs and how they are conjugated. Having all the verb sheets you need is great but unless you have an effective method of learning them you will still struggle. For years the only way to learn verbs was to recite and recite some more until you had memorized them…very tedious and boring, not to mention time consuming!

Well this has all changed with a revolutionary new software program that not only focuses the mind on specific problem areas but does so without the student ever becoming bored and the results are fast too with many users reporting excellent results. This revolutionary verb training software is called verbarrator and it demotes verb books and other verb programs to being only needed as reference tools.

If you would like to know more about how the verbarrator is revolutionizing verb study check out my detailed and honest review at http://www.irregularspanishverbs.com/verbarratorreview.html and should you then decide that the program is exactly what you need and decide to purchase, you would be wise to do so from my site rather than from anywhere else. This is because you will also receive a copy of my book ‘2000+ Spanish Irregular Verbs‘ completely free which normally costs $16! (You can also check out the ‘only slightly biased’ review of this book on my site using the link above!)

For further reading why not read my post about why the Spanish verb haber is the most important verb in the Spanish language.

How to Conjugate in Spanish

Learning how to conjugate in Spanish is without doubt the most difficult part of learning the Spanish language. Spanish has an extremely high number of irregular verbs, some more irregular than others, and as well as having to learn new conjugations for all of the common tenses there is also the subjunctive to learn, which is rarely used in English but extremely common in Spanish.

When considering all of the factors spelled out above, it is little wonder that many students give up all because they fail to master Spanish verb conjugation.

However, there is a new software program that has been a resounding success in helping struggling students get past their personal stumbling blocks and it does it quickly too!

The name of that program is Verbarrator and it not only provides excellent verb training but it is enjoyable to use and speeds up the learning process! More about the Verbarrator later…back to learning to conjugate in Spanish!

The simplest way to explain how to conjugate in Spanish is to show Spanish conjugation in it’s simplest form which is a regular verb in the present tense. If you are not aware already, you need to know that there are three different verb groups in Spanish, and those groups are comprised of verbs that end in ar, er and ir.

Here is the basic present tense conjugation for a verb from each of the regular verb groups.

• Trabajar – to work
• I work – trabajo
• You work – trabajas
• he/she works – trabaja
• we work – trabajamos
• you all work – trabajaís
• they work – trabajan

• Abrir – to open
• I open – abro
• You open – abres
• he/she open – abre
• we open – abrimos
• you all open – abrís
• they open – abren

• Aprender – to learn
• I learn – aprendo
• You learn – aprendes
• he/she learn – aprende
• we learn – aprendemos
• you all learn – aprendéis
• they learn – aprenden

Please remember, these are just the basics, for more on verb conjugation why not visit our main site irregular spanish verbs and sign up for the free verb conjugation book that includes full conjugation sheets for 50 of the most commonly used regular verbs or check out our verbarrator review, the newest verb training software online.

Spanish verb conjugation is an extremely important part of learning Spanish, unfortunately it is also one of the most difficult aspects of studying the language and as such is disliked by most students. However, if the objective of the student is to become fluent then Spanish verb conjugation is one aspect of the Spanish language that requires the student to have a complete mastery of. .. continue reading ..

Spanish verb conjugators have been used for as long as languages have been taught. Question is how can traditional verb conjugation tables be improved upon to make the job of learning Spanish verb conjugation easier and quicker? .. continue reading ..