#Present perfect vs past perfect spanish how to#

This would be the past simple tense (or pretérito perfecto simple in Spanish) which covers an event or action with a clear start and end that both took place in the past. This action has started and ended, but is quite close to the present as the day is not over yet, which is why we use present perfect or pretérito perfecto compuesto here.

The actual tense is more nuanced than that, but we’ll look at it in more detail below.įor now, let stick to this concept and take a look at another example: This means we are talking about something that started in the past and ended in the present. This describes the use of the present perfect in Spanish best. Past tenses in SpanishĪ past event can be one that: Started in the past and ended recently To begin with, let’s take a look at the most common past tenses in Spanish for reference and to avoid confusion. Now that we know what we’re talking about, let’s take a look at when to use the present perfect in Spanish.

He salido poco últimamente ( I’ve not gone out much lately.).

Now let’s see a few examples with the present perfect Spanish form of salir, ir and cocinar : Let’s see an example for each verb ending:įor a more detailed explanation, check out or article on the past participle in Spanish.īoth the auxiliary verb haber and the participio are used in all compuesto tenses in Spanish, in both the indicative and subjunctive moods. To form the participio you will need to drop these endings from the infinitive form and then add -ado for those verbs ending in -ar and -ido for the verbs ending in -er and -ir. You may have some doubts when it comes to the participle, particularly as there are three verb endings in the Spanish language ( -ar, -er, and -ir). You can take a look at the entire haber conjugation in this article, but let’s see an example of the present perfect Spanish tense below: SubjectĪs you can see, you have the conjugation of the verb haber for each person in the present tense and, in this case, the participle for the verb salir (to go out). The verb haber is used here as an auxiliary. The present perfect in Spanish is formed with the verb haber (to have) in the present tense and the participle of the verb in question.

#Present perfect vs past perfect spanish how to#

How to form the present perfect in Spanish This indicative mood tense is used to talk about the past and, below, we’ll go over how to form the present perfect Spanish tense and when to use it, as well as how it is different from other past tenses. They all take some time to learn, which is why, in this article, we’ll be focusing on one particular form that didn’t get much attention yet: the pretérito perfecto compuesto, antepresente or present perfect. We know Spanish tenses are plentiful and complicated.