Spanish Grammar

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GRAMMAR INDEX

Spanish Grammar A1 ⮟
Ser and Estar in Spanish for Beginners
Está and Hay in Spanish to Express Location
The Present Indicative in Spanish
The verb querer in Spanish: how to use it
The Verb Gustar in Spanish
Demonstratives in Spanish and Adverbs of Place
Possessive Adjectives in Spanish
The Present Continuous in Spanish: Estar + Gerund
The Gerund in Spanish: Form and Basic Uses
Expressions of Quantity in Spanish: Muy and Mucho
Spanish Grammar A2 ⮟
Present Perfect Indicative in Spanish
The Past Simple in Spanish
The Preterite Imperfect Indicative in Spanish
Indicative past tenses in Spanish
How to Express Future in Spanish
How to use por and para in Spanish
Possessive Pronouns in Spanish
Comparative Adjectives in Spanish
Ya in Spanish: Meaning and Usage
Subject Personal Pronouns in Spanish
Expressing Obligation in Spanish
Spanish Grammar B1 ⮟
The Pluperfect Indicative in Spanish
The Future Simple in Spanish
The Conditional Simple in Spanish
The imperative mood in Spanish
The present subjunctive in Spanish
Verbal Periphrasis in Spanish
General Rules of Accentuation in Spanish
Expressing Wishes with the Subjunctive in Spanish
The Use of Cuando with Indicative and Subjunctive
Position of Object Pronouns in Spanish
Spanish Grammar B2 ⮟
Advanced Uses of Conditional Simple
The Future Perfect in Spanish
The Conditional Perfect in Spanish
Present Perfect Subjunctive in Spanish
How do I use the past imperfect subjunctive?
The Pluperfect Subjunctive in Spanish
How to express probability in Spanish
Conditional Clauses in Spanish
Verbs of Change in Spanish
Reported Speech in Spanish
Spanish Grammar C1 ⮟
The passive Voice in Spanish
Adverbial Clauses of Manner in Spanish
Adverbial Clauses of Cause in Spanish
Clauses of Purpose in Spanish
Conditional Conjunctions in Spanish
Uses of the Pronoun SE with Syntactic Function
Uses of the Pronoun Se as a Verb Mark
The Indeterminate Feminine in Spanish

Advanced Uses of Conditional Simple

The conditional simple in Spanish is a verb tense that offers us a multitude of uses: advice, hypothesis, politeness, modesty, desires… Today we are going to learn some advanced uses of the conditional simple. So, if you don’t remember how this tense is formed, or what its basic uses are, we recommend you to read our article on the conditional simple in Spanish. However, we leave you here an infographic to remind you:

Infographic: the conditional simple in spanish

Advanced Uses of Conditional Simple: the Reported Speech

We use The conditional simple in Spanish in the reported speech. In this way, we express an action subsequent to another action in the past. You can learn more about this way of speaking in this article about the reported speech in Spanish.

With this usage, we can check the intrinsic relationship between the conditional and the future. When the speaker makes use of the future in the reported speech, this tense will change to the conditional in the reported style. This is why it is said that “the conditional is a future of the past“.

María dijo: “mañana me iré de vacaciones”.

María dijo que el día siguiente se iría de vacaciones.

 

 

Conditional as Probability in the Past

Another advanced use of the conditional simple in Spanish is to express a hypothesis or probability in the past. These are actions of which we are not sure in a past tense. With this use, the conditional is related to the present perfect simple. If we are sure of the fact, we use the preterite, if we are not, we can use the conditional. In addition to this tense, we can reinforce the idea of probability with expressions such as probablemente, no sé, quizá…:

Ayer mi amigo hizo el examen DELE. (I’m sure).

Quizá ayer mi amigo haría el examen DELE. (I’m not sure).

Advanced Uses of the Conditional Simple: Improbable Wishes

The expression of wishes is one of the advanced uses of the conditional simple that you may already know, in part. Surely, basic students of Spanish know how to use the verb gustar in the conditional. Let’s see an example:

Me gustaría vivir en España.

However, things get complicated when we have to express a wish that affects another person. In that case, we will use the main verb in the conditional simple, followed by a subordinate clause. The verb of this clause will be the imperfect subjunctive. If you don’t remember its forms and uses, take a look at this article on the forms and uses of the imperfect preterite subjunctive.

Me gustaría que mis hijos vivieran en España.

Mis padres querrían que yo estudiara más.

Conditional Sentences in Spanish

Finally, we will finish with one of the most complicated advanced uses of the conditional simple: conditional sentences. This type of sentence expresses the condition necessary for the verbal action to take place. They are made up of two propositions: one introduced by a conditional connector (si, a unless, de + infinitive…) and the other, which is the main one, with the verb in the conditional simple. In the subordinate clause, we will normally use the imperfect subjunctive.

Si tuviera más dinero, me compraría una casa nueva.

However, this type of conditional sentence is not the only one in our language. We recommend you this article to learn the other types of conditionals in Spanish.

As we can see, in the advanced uses of the conditional simple, there is a great relationship with the imperfect subjunctive. If you want to learn these tenses and use them naturally, reserve Spanish classes for different levels: Nos gustaría que aprendieras en Spanishviaskype.com.

Infographic on the advanced uses of the simple conditional in Spanish