SPANISH CONDITIONAL TENSE

The Spanish conditional tense is used to express hypothetical situations, polite requests, or actions that would happen under certain conditions.

Be careful with the conjugations, but do not fear! We teach you everything there is to know.

INTRODUCTION

The conditional tense in Spanish, referred to as Condicional Simple (or Condicional), is a tense that is generally used to place the action expressed by the verb either at a later point in time than that of another past event or within a hypothetical framework, like for example:

Play Él dijo que volvería a España.

He said he would return to Spain.

In the example above, the verb volver (to return/go back) expresses an action that takes place at a later point in time in relation to the earlier event, él dijo (he said).

So the Condicional in this case sets the stage for an action that follows another (past) event.

FORMING THE CONDITIONAL TENSE

The Continuous Tense in Spanish is formed by adding a pattern of endings to the infinitive form of the regular verbs. These specific endings are identical for all three conjugations (-ar, -er, -ir).

FOR REGULAR VERBS

When forming the Condicional in Spanish with regular verbs, these will maintain their infinitive endings and a specific pattern of endings is added, which is the same for all three verb conjugations (-ar, -er, -ir).

To conjugate regular verbs in the Condicional tense, attach the corresponding endings below to the infinitive form of the verb (-ar, -er, -ir).

Examples:

Using the verb llamar (to call)

Using the verb andar (to walk)

FOR IRREGULAR VERBS

In Spanish, some verbs are irregular in the Condicional because they have a stem change.

Meaning, they undergo a spelling change, although they still follow the regular pattern of endings as the regular verbs (-ar, -er, -ir) in the conditional tense.

These are some of the most commonly used irregular verbs in the conditional tense:

Let’s see some examples:

Using the verb hacer (to do)

Using the verb poder (to be able to)

USAGES OF THE CONDITIONAL TENSE

The Conditional tense has a series of different possible uses, mainly:

• to introduce a hypothetical or imaginary situation.

• to express polite requests or politely communicate a wish.

• to give mild-mannered orders, suggestions or advise in a toned-down manner.

• to refer to a future action from a past perspective, indicating in a way what was going to happen.

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