Learn about all the different Spanish verb tenses, moods, and voices: present, past, future; conditional, subjunctive, imperative; active, passive, pronominal voice.

  
Compound Tenses
Spanish verb conjugations can be divided into simple tenses and compound tenses, and compound tenses can be subdivided into two categories: progressive tenses and perfect tenses. This lesson will explain what you need to know about compound tenses.

Conditional
The conditional is a verb mood used for events that are not guaranteed to occur; often they are dependent on certain conditions. It is translated as would in English.

Conditional Perfect
The Spanish past conditional (aka conditional perfect) is used to indicate an action that would have occurred in the past if a certain condition had been met.

Conditional Progressive
The Spanish conditional progressive - el potencial progresivo - is very similar to its English counterpart (would be + -ing). In both languages, the conditional progressive expresses an action that would be in progress at a certain point in time. In Spanish, it can also make a conjecture about what might or must be happening.

Future
The future - used to talk about upcoming actions - is one of the simplest Spanish tenses. There is only one set of future endings and most verbs use their infinitive as the root of the conjugation.

Future Perfect ~ Futuro perfecto
The Spanish future perfect is used to indicate an action that will have taken place before another action or point in the future, as well as to express probability or supposition about events or situations in the past.

Future Progressive ~ Futuro progresivo
The Spanish future progressive is very similar to its English counterpart. In both languages, the future progressive expresses an action that will be in progress at a certain point in the future.

Future Subjunctive
The future subjunctive is supposed to be used when a verb or expression requiring the subjunctive in the main clause is in the present or future and refers to a future action.

Imperative
The imperative is a verb mood used to give a command, either affirmative (Go!) or negative (Don't go!).

Imperfect
The imperfect tense is used to talk about a past action or state of being without specifying when it began or ended.

Imperfect Progressive
The Spanish imperfect progressive - el imperfecto progresivo - is very similar to its English counterpart (was + -ing). In both languages, the imperfect progressive expresses an action that was in progress in the past when it was interrupted by another event.

Imperfect Subjunctive
The imperfect tense of the subjunctive mood is used to express the same subjective attitudes as the present subjunctive, but in the past. There are two complete sets of conjugations; you only need to memorize and use one, but you'll still need to recognize both.

Infinitive
The infinitive is the basic, unconjugated form of a verb, sometimes called the name of the verb. We usually learn Spanish verbs in the infinitive, since that is what you start with in order to conjugate them. But the infinitive is also used in its unconjugated form - learn how.

Mood
Mood refers to the verb forms that express the attitude of the speaker toward the action/state of the verb - how likely or factual the statement is. The Spanish language has six or seven moods, depending on how you look at it.

Pasado: Pretérito vs Imperfecto
Learn the difference between the two most common Spanish past tenses.

Passive Voice
Voice is a grammatical term which indicates the relationship between a subject and verb. There are three different voices in Spanish. In the passive voice, the action described by the verb is being done to the subject by an agent.

Past Participle
The English past participle is the -ed form of the verb. In Spanish, it's the -do form. The Spanish past participle is used mainly in perfect tenses.

Perfect Infinitive
The Spanish perfect infinitive indicates an action that occurred before the action of the main verb, but only when the subject of both verbs is the same. The perfect infinitive sounds awkward in English - we usually change it to another tense or reword the sentence completely.

Pluperfect
The Spanish pluperfect (aka past perfect) is used to indicate an action in the past that occurred before another action in the past. The latter can be either mentioned in the same sentence or implied.

Pluperfect Subjunctive
The pluperfect tense of the subjunctive mood is used to express the same subjectivity as the present subjunctive, but, like the pluperfect indicative, at a point before another action in the past.

Present
The Spanish present tense, called el presente, is similar but not identical in usage to the English present tense.

Present Participle - Gerundio
The English present participle is the -ing form of the verb. In Spanish, it's the -ndo form. The Spanish present participle has two main uses: as a gerund and in progressive tenses.

Present Perfect - Pretérito perfecto
The Spanish present perfect is used just like its English counterpart: to express that something has happened at some point before now, at an unspecified time in the past.

Present Perfect Subjunctive
The present perfect subjunctive, also known as the past or perfect subjunctive, is used when a verb or expression requiring the subjunctive in the main clause is in the present, future, or present perfect and the dependent clause is in the past.

Present Progressive
The Spanish present progressive, or present continuous, is very similar to its English counterpart (to be + -ing). In both languages, the present progressive expresses an in-progress action, with an emphasis on its current, temporary nature.

Pretérito
The pretérito is the Spanish simple past tense, used to talk about things that were completed in the past.

Preterite Perfect / Past Anterior
The Spanish preterite perfect is used to indicate an action in the past that occurred just before another action in the past. The preterite perfect is very rare in spoken Spanish - it is found almost exclusively in formal writing such as literature.

Preterite Progressive
The use of the preterite progressive stresses the fact that the action was completed at the time of the interruption.

Subjunctive
The subjunctive is usually considered the most difficult Spanish verb form for students, but hopefully this lesson will simplify matters for you. Here are conjugations and detailed explanations of usage.

Voice - La voz
Voice is one of the five inflections involved in conjugating Spanish verbs. It indicates the relationship between the subject and verb. There are three voices in Spanish.

Spanish Verbs

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