Subjunctive Irregular Spanish Verb Conjugation

Learn the subjunctive irregulars, then come back and review with audio flash cards and the Lingo Dingo.

The irregular subjunctives are the same as the Ud./Uds. irregular commands you already learned except here they are conjugated for each person. Like the commands, there are 3 sets of irregular verbs. It’s good to go through these verbs enough so that they become second nature and you don’t even have to think as you conjugate them. That’s the key to true fluency.

AR Subjunctive Endings

ER IR Subjunctive Endings

First we’ll look at a group of 18 irregulars. With 15 of the 18 of these, to get the stem, you take the “yo” present tense form, then put on the opposite endings. For example, the “yo” present tense form of “to have” is “tengo”, then you just take off the “o” and put on the opposite endings. Let’s take a look at the first 15 that follow this rule.

Now if we use “tenga” as an example, and conjugate it out fully for each person, it would be “tenga, tengas, tenga, tengamos, tengáis, tengan”. All the other verbs are the same. The rule of taking the “yo” form of the present tense conjugation to find the stem also applies to this second group of irregular verbs. These are stem-changing verb that you learned back in present tense. Let’s take a look at these:

As you can see, “cerrar” become “cierre”. Let’s conjugate that out “cierre, cierres, cierre, cerremos, cerréis, and cierren”. Did you notice that the “nosotros” and “vosotros” forms didn’t use the stem changes. Remember, “nosotros” likes to stay regular as much as possible. The only exception is “preferir” which becomes “prefiramos”.

The same is true with o to ue. Let’s conjugate out poder so you can see how it works: “pueda, puedas, pueda, podamos, podáis, puedan”. Again, the “nosotros” likes to stay regular and not use the stem changes. The only exceptions are “muramos” and “durmamos”.

Now let’s look at e to i stem changers and i to y stem changers. With these verbs, the nosotros follows the pattern.

Let’s look at two of them so you can see what I mean. First we’ll look at the verb pedir:  “pida, pidas, pida, pidamos, pidáis, pidan”.

Now we’ll look at destruir: “destruya, destruyas, destruya, destruyamos, destruyáis, destruyan”.

Now we’ll look at the third and final group of irregulars. Like the commands, they are only irregular in spelling. Please see the “commands” section for more on exactly why we do the spelling changes. The spelling changes are consistent through each person. For example, let’s look at the subjunctive conjugation of “pagar” – pague, pagues, pague, paguemos, paguéis, paguen. Here’s a chart of irregulars to look at and become familiar with.

Spelling Changes

Finally, there are 2 verbs that are irregular in the fact that they need accents. The verb “dar” and “estar” and notice where the accents go.

Dar – to give

Estar – to be

You’ve now learned the all the subjunctive irregulars. There are a lot here and we recommend going through this lesson a few times to become really familiar with them.

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