Irregular verbs in Spanish in the present indicative

Spanish is a language that has many irregular verbs. This is mainly due to phonetic changes that lead to vowel alterations (to have it has; sleep - I sleep), consonant alterations (do - I do; know - I know) or a mixture of both (put - put; know - I know).

In this lesson from a TEACHER we are going to pay special attention to the irregular verbs in Spanish that cause more problems when it comes to expressing oneself, either orally or in writing. Specifically, we will focus on the present indicative.

Within the paradigm of each of the conjugations that exist in Spanish (the first conjugation or verbs ending in -ar, the second conjugation or verbs ending in -er and, finally, the third conjugation or, what is the same, the verbs that end in -to go) we can establish the following division: regular verbs and irregular verbs.

An irregular verb is one that does not follow the conjugation rules dictated by regular verbs but presents a particularly different conjugation pattern, which changes from the root itself. For this reason, we understand that, when a verb undergoes modifications in the root in any of the conjugations of any of its

verb tenses and modes, it is an irregular verb.

For example, the verb "measure", The root of which is "med-" is an irregular verb because the first person singular of the present indicative is "I mido" when the expectation would be * I medo.

It is important to note that irregular verbs are not always irregular in all verb tenses, for example, the first person singular of the future indicative of the verb "measure" is "I will measure" and, therefore, regular as to conjugation.

In this section we are going to detail which are the most common irregular verbs in terms of present indicative it means. For example, we have the verb "understand" as an example of the vowel irregularity "e> ie": I understand, you understand, understand, we understand, you understand, understand. It is important that you notice that irregularity is not present in all people, but it is still an irregular verb despite it.

More vowel alterations in the present would be: "o> ue" with the verb "power" I can, you can, you can, we can, you can, you can; "e> i" with the verb "feel" I feel, feel, feel, feel, feel, feel and finally, "u> ue" with verbs like "play" I play, you play, play, we play, play, play.

Other verbs only present irregularities in the first person singular of the present indicative, such as "dar" give, "make" do, "to know" he or "get out" I go out.

On the other hand, some verbs combine vowel irregularities with consonants, as is the case of the following verbs: "say" say, "hear" i hear, "to have" I have and "come" I come.

Two of the verbs that cause the most problems due to their constant irregularities and alternations, both vowel and consonant are the verbs "ir" and "ser". Both verbs are completely irregular in the present indicative, conjugating as follows:

• verb "go": I go, go, go, come on, go, go.
• verb to be": I am, you are, it is, we are, you are, you are.

On the other hand, when the verb form only modifies a consonant for spelling reasons unrelated to the verbal model from which it starts, is not considered a sufficient reason to consider this verb as irregular. This is the case of the verb "take", which makes the first person singular of the present indicative lame and continues the paradigm with You take, take, we take, take, take.