How To Conjugate Regular Spanish Verbs In the Present Tense

There are three types of Spanish verb, there are those ending in -AR, such as hablar (to speak), those ending in -ER, such as comer (to eat) and those ending in -IR (to live) and they have different rules. -ER and -IR verb rules are mostly the same in the present tense, except for the forms of we and you plural.

When conjugating verbs you need to know the rules for doing so, according to the person (I, you, he etc), and the simplest way to do this is as follows.

I

You (singular)

He / she/ it

We

You (plural)

They

This is also known as first, second and third person singular followed by first, second and third person plural.

In English, verb conjugations are simple because usually only the third person singular form changes (the he/she/it form) whereby an -s is usually added.

So:

I run

You run

He/she/it runs

We run

You all run

They run

In Spanish (and most other languages) they all change according to the ending.

Firstly, the pronouns in Spanish are

Yo (I)

Tu (you)

El / ella (he/she)

We (nosotros)

You all (vosotros)

They (ellos/ellas)

But whilst it's important to know these translations of the pronouns, they are not often used in Spanish speaking, as it's just assumed who is being reffered to by the conjugation itself.

So onto the conjugations.

-AR verbs

(Yo) hablo

(Tu) hablas

(El) habla

(Nosotros) hablamos

(Vosotros) hablaís

(Ellos) hablan

-ER verbs

(Yo) como

(Tu) comes

(El) come

(Nosotros) comemos

(Vosotros) comeís

(Ellos) comen

-IR verbs

(Yo) vivo

(Tu) vives

(El) vive

(Nosotros)vivimos

(Vosotros) vivís

(Ellos) viven

These are the rules for regular verbs in the present tense.

Some example sentences – remember it's not usual to use the pronoun in Spanish.

Vivo en una casa grande --- I live in a big house

Hablamos italiano --- we speak Italian

¿Comes carne? --- do you eat meat?

Vive en Escocia --- he/she lives in Scotland

Comen helados --- they are eating ice creams

Now you know how to conjugate regular Spanish verbs you can improve your Spanish skills quickly.