Irregular Verbs in Spanish

By: Juilet England - Updated: 12 Jan 2013 | *Discuss

 

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Some irregular verbs display the same irregularities, so that if you know one you can predict the forms of any of the others in the same group.

There’s no real magic trick with irregular verbs – they just need to be learned. As you become more experienced with using Spanish, the more the right verb form will come naturally.

Radical Changing Verbs

The biggest group of predictably irregular Spanish verbs are called radical changing, or sometimes stem changing.

In some verbs the stem (i.e the first part of the verb) changes when stressed, depending on the person and tense.

There are three main types of these sorts of verbs:

Type 1: -ar and –er Verbs

The changes occur only in the present tenses (subjunctive and indicative), when the stem is stressed. In practice, this means all three singular forms and the third person plural form. The other forms do not change. The ‘e’ in the stem becomes ‘ie’, the ‘o’ becomes ‘ue’, as does the ‘u’ – although in fact this only applies to the verb ‘jugar’ (to play.)

So ‘pensar’ (to think) in the present indicative is as follows:

pienso, piensas, piensa, piensan

And in the present subjunctive: piense, pienses, piense, piensen

Have a look at volver (to return):

Present indicative: vuelvo, vuelves, vuelve, vuelve, vuelven

Present subjunctive: vuelva, vuelvas, vuelva, vuelva, vuelvan

And note the stem change in the verb jugar, to play:

Present indicative: juego, juegas, juega, juegan

Present subjunctive: juege, jueges, juege, juegen

Type 2: - ir Verbs

These kinds of Spanish verbs,like mentir, to lie and dormir, to sleep, have the same changes in the same places as above. But, additionally, there is a stem change from ‘e’ to ‘i’ and ‘o’ to ‘u’ in the following tenses:

Gerund (remember this translates as ‘-ing’ in English) – mintiendo, durmiendo.

Present subjunctive (first and second person plural forms) – mintamos, mintáis; durmamos, durmáis

Preterite (third person, both singular and plural) – mintió, durmió

Type 3: - ir Verbs

Verbs of this type have the stem change in the same way as the second type, but this always from ‘e’ to ‘i’.

A good example is the verb ‘pedir’ – to ask for or request.

Present indicative: pido, pides, pide, piden

Present subjunctive: pida, pidas, pida, pidamos, pidáis, pidan

Gerund : pidiendo

Preterite : pidió, pidieron

Irregular ‘g’ Verbs

There is a group of words in which the stem of the present indicative contains ‘g’ in the first person singular form only, and throughout the present subjunctive.

Some have a regular present indicative tense apart from the first person – others have stem changes.

Here’s an example – a very common verb, ‘hacer’, which means to do or to make.

Present indicative: hago, haces, hace, hacemos, hacéis, hacen

Present indicative: haga, hagas, haga, hagamos, hagáis, hagan

Tener, to have, again, an extremely commonly used verb:

Present indicative: tengo, tienes, tiene, tenemos, tenéis, tienen

Present indicative: tenga, tengas, tenga, tengamos, tengáis, tengan

The following verbs all have a similar pattern:

Caer – to fall

Poner – to put

Salir - to go out

Valer - to be worth

Decir - to say

Oír - to hear

Irregular ‘zc' Verbs

Another pretty large group with an irregular first person singular form in the present indicative are verbs whose infinitives end in –ecer, -ocer, and –ucir.

The stem of the first person form of the present indicative, and so all of the present subjunctive forms, ends in ‘zc’.

Parecer (to seem)

Present indicative: parezco, pareces, parece, parecemos, pareceís, parecen

Present subjunctive: parezca, parezcas, parezca, parezcamos, parezcáis, parezcan

The following verbs follow the same pattern:

Conocer – to know, to get to know

Reconocer – to recognise

Aparacer – to appear

Desaparacer – to disappear

Ofrecer - to offer

Conducir - to drive, conduct or lead

Producir – to produce

Irregular ‘oy’ Verbs

In these verbs, the first person singular form of the present indicative ends in ‘oy’. This does not affect any subjunctive forms.

The verb ‘dar’, to give, is an example: doy, das, da, damos, dais, dan

Note also the verb ‘estar’, one of two Spanish verbs to be: estoy, estás, está, estáis, estamos, están.

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