The Conditional Tense — Formation
Form the conditional tense by adding -ía endings to the infinitive: hablaría, comería, viviría. Learn the irregular stems (tener → tendría, poder → podría, hacer → haría, decir → diría). Use the conditional for polite requests and future-in-the-past.
A lesson of Spanish B1 — Intermediate, in Conditionals & Hypotheticals, about 10 minutes.
By the end of this lesson, you will be able to form the conditional tense for regular and irregular Spanish verbs and understand its core meaning of "would."
What Is the Conditional Tense?
The conditional tense (el condicional) expresses what would happen under certain circumstances. It is the Spanish equivalent of "would + verb" in English:
Yo hablaría español si viviera en México. — I would speak Spanish if I lived in Mexico. ¿Podrías ayudarme? — Would you be able to help me? Me gustaría un café, por favor. — I would like a coffee, please.
Forming the Conditional: Regular Verbs
The conditional is one of the easiest tenses to form because:
- You start with the full infinitive (not a stem) — for all verb types (-AR, -ER, -IR).
- You add the same set of endings regardless of verb class.
Conditional Endings (same for all verbs)
| Pronoun | Ending |
|---|---|
| yo | -ía |
| tú | -ías |
| él/ella/Ud. | -ía |
| nosotros | -íamos |
| vosotros | -íais |
| ellos/Uds. | -ían |
Examples
| Infinitive | yo | tú | él/ella | nosotros | ellos |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| hablar | hablaría | hablarías | hablaría | hablaríamos | hablarían |
| comer | comería | comerías | comería | comeríamos | comerían |