Topic:
Only twelve verbs plus their compounds are irregular in the conditional. Practice them in this lesson.
Irregular Verbs in the Conditional
If you already studied the future tense, and you just learned the basics of the conditional in the previous lesson, I have good news.
You already know everything that you need to know about irregular verbs in the conditional.
Let's take tener as an example.
Conditional conjugation of tener
Exactly as we did in the future tense, the stem here takes the infinitive tener and changes it slightly to be tendr-.
It is the same stem as the future tense, just with new endings.
That's it.
Same Irregular Verbs, Same Stem Changes
Those twelve verbs that you learned in the future tense are listed here with the same changes in the conditional:
| Infinitive | Conditional Stem | Meaning | Yo Form |
|---|---|---|---|
| tener | tendr- | would have | tendría |
| poner | pondr- | would put | pondría |
| valer | valdr- | would be worth | valdría |
| salir | saldr- | would go out | saldría |
| venir | vendr- | would come | vendría |
| poder | podr- | would be able | podría |
| caber | cabr- | would fit | cabría |
| haber | habr- | would have | habría |
| saber | sabr- | would know | sabría |
| querer | querr- | would want | querría |
| hacer | har- | would do | haría |
| decir | dir- | would say | diría |
Compound verbs that end with one of these verbs share the irregularity.
For example, the verb mantener meaning to maintain is a compound from tener so it looks like this:
Conditional conjugation of mantener
Conditional Tense of poder means could
One very common irregular verb from the list above is poder.
The meaning here makes a lot of sense, because would be able to is really just could.
Example:
Could you help me with the luggage?
¿Podrías ayudarme con las maletas?
All the verbs in the exercises use one of these altered stems, so let's get some practice.
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On to the Exercises and the Quiz
To practice the verb forms in this lesson, click Practice Exercises below.
Whenever you want, you can take the quiz for this lesson.
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