Talking about the Present: Regular Verbs in the Present Indicative I

Spanish verbs work differently than English verbs. Although they can be challenging to learn, if you look at them step by step, you'll see that the verb system is both sensible and efficient.

To talk about things happening in the present, we use the present indicative tense:

• Yo hablo. I speak. I do speak. I am speaking.
  Nosotros hablamos. We speak. We do speak. We are speaking.

Notice that the one sentence in Spanish has three equivalents in English!


In English, we know who is doing the speaking by the subject pronoun, in this case I or we:

• Hablo. I speak. I do speak. I am speaking.
  Hablamos. We speak. We do speak. We are speaking.

Notice the endings -o and -amos. In Spanish, the subject pronoun is usually not necessary, because the verb ending tells us who is doing the action of the verb.


There are three classes of "regular" verbs in Spanish -- "regular" meaning that they follow a pattern when we "conjugate" the verb, which usually means changing the verb's endings to match the subject.

Here is a model verb from each class:

-AR	HABLAR	to speak
-ER	COMER	to eat
-IR	VIVIR	to live

The verb in this form, with the -ar, -er or -ir ending, is called the infinitive.  In English, the "to" of to speak, to eat and to live tells us that the verb is in infinitive form. All infinitives in English begin with to. All infinitives in Spanish end with -ar, -er or -ir.


The part of verb without the -ar, -er or -ir ending is called the stem, and it is the part on which the verb conjugation is built.


Let's begin by learning to talk about ourselves. Remember, the subject pronoun is usually not needed, because the ending clearly indicates who is doing the action of the verb:

I speak	(yo) hablo
we speak	(nosotros) hablamos
I eat	(yo) como
we eat	(nosotros) comemos
I live	(yo) vivo
we live	(nosotros) vivimos

Notice that all the I (yo) forms end in -o and the we (nosotros) forms end in -mos. However, the nosotros forms also vary. Notice that hablamos has the a of hablar, comemos has the e of comer, and vivimos has the i of vivir.

Each class of verbs has its own set of endings.


Let's continue by learning to speak to one or more people using the formal, polite, verb form.

you speak	(usted) habla
you-all speak	(ustedes) hablan
you eat	(usted) come
you-all eat	(ustedes) comen
you live	(usted) vive
you-all live	(ustedes) viven

Once again, we see that the ending depends on whether we're conjugating an -ar, -er or -ir verb.


To sum up, to talk about yourself, or to one or more people using the formal, polite form, follow the following steps:

• 1. Identify the infinitive.
  2. Determine whether it's an -ar, -er or -ir verb.
  3. Obtain the stem by deleting the -ar, -er or -ir ending.
  4. Add the following endings on to the stem:

verb class	yo	nosotros	usted	ustedes
-ar	-o	-amos	-a	-an
-er	-o	-emos	-e	-en
-ir	-o	-imos	-e	-en

The good news is that once you've learned these endings, you can use them with any regular -ar, -er or -ir class verbs. Here are some examples:

estudiar	(yo) estudio	I study
correr	(usted) corre	you (formal) run
insistir	(nosotros) insistimos	we insist
cantar	(ustedes) cantan	you-all (formal) sing

Notice how the endings alone tell you the subject (who is doing) the verb. The subject pronouns (yo, usted, nosotros, ustedes) are not needed.