Italian 2: The Present Tense

One word, parliamo, tells you who is speaking (we), when (now) and how many people are involved, with no help from any other word. English needs “we speak” for the same job. That is the idea behind Italian verbs: the ending does the work the pronoun does in English.

It looks like a lot of forms until you notice that the endings repeat. Learn three small tables, plus one twist for a group of -ire verbs, and you can build the present tense of hundreds of verbs, including ones you have never seen. This piece teaches those tables, the ways Italian says “you”, and gives you a trainer that drills the forms and brings back the ones you miss. The irregular verbs wait for the next piece, so everything here follows the pattern.

Your device has no Italian voice, so the play buttons are hidden.

Who is acting: the subject pronouns

Italian has a pronoun for each person, but you will hear them less than you expect, for a reason that comes in a moment.

Italian	English	Note
io	I	no capital letter
tu	you (one person, informal)	friends, family, children, people your age
lui, lei	he, she
Lei	you (one person, formal)	takes the same verb form as lei, “she”
noi	we
voi	you (more than one person)	informal and, today, usually formal too
loro	they	also a very formal plural “you”, now rare

Who is “you”?

Italian splits “you” by number and by distance. With one person you know well, use tu. With a stranger, an older person, a shop assistant or an official, use Lei, the formal “you”. Lei is grammatically “she”, so it takes the third-person form: Lei parla inglese? means “Do you speak English?”, said to a man or a woman. In writing it is often capitalised to tell it from lei, she. For more than one person, voi covers almost every situation. You may still hear voi used as a polite singular in parts of the south, and Loro as a very formal plural in a grand hotel; both are fine to recognise and rarely needed.

The switch from Lei to tu is a small social event. Young people and colleagues use tu quickly; with older people or in formal settings, wait to be invited, or ask: Possiamo darci del tu? (“Shall we use tu?”). Starting with Lei is never rude. Starting with tu can be.

A verb is a stem plus an ending

The form you find in a dictionary is the infinitive, and it ends in -are, -ere or -ire. That ending names the verb’s family. Take it off and what remains is the stem: parl-, prend-, dorm-. The present tense is the stem plus an ending that shows who is acting.

	-are parlare	-ere prendere	-ire dormire	-ire (-isc-) finire
io	parlo	prendo	dormo	finisco
tu	parli	prendi	dormi	finisci
lui, lei, Lei	parla	prende	dorme	finisce
noi	parliamo	prendiamo	dormiamo	finiamo
voi	parlate	prendete	dormite	finite
loro	parlano	prendono	dormono	finiscono

Read the table by row and you will see how little there is to learn. io always ends in -o, tu always in -i, and noi always in -iamo, in every family. The voi form simply keeps the infinitive’s vowel: parlate, prendete, dormite. The families differ in only two places: -are verbs use a for lui and loro (parla, parlano), while -ere and -ire verbs use e and o (prende, prendono). -Ere and plain -ire verbs are identical except for voi.

The -isc- verbs

Many -ire verbs add -isc- between the stem and the ending in four forms: io, tu, lui and loro. Noi and voi have no -isc-. The shape follows the stress: -isc- appears where the stress would fall on the stem, and drops out where it falls on the ending (finiamo, finite). In finisco and capisci the sc follows the rule from the last piece: “sk” before o, “sh” before e and i.

The spelling of the infinitive does not tell you which -ire verbs take -isc-. Common ones include capire (understand), finire (finish), preferire (prefer), pulire (clean), spedire (send), costruire (build) and suggerire (suggest). Common ones without it include dormire, partire (leave), sentire (hear, feel), aprire (open), offrire (offer) and seguire (follow). Learn each -ire verb with its io form, capire: capisco, and you will never have to guess.

Spelling changes that keep the sound

A few -are verbs change their spelling but not their sound, using the c and g rules from Italian 1:

• -care and -gare add an h before an ending that starts with i, to keep the hard sound: cercare gives cerco, cerchi, cerchiamo; pagare gives pago, paghi, paghiamo.
• -ciare and -giare drop their i when the ending already starts with i, because the i only softened the consonant: mangiare gives mangio, mangi, mangiamo; cominciare gives comincio, cominci.
• Other -iare verbs write one i, not two: studiare gives studio, studi, studiamo; cambiare gives cambi.

These are not irregular verbs. If you say the form aloud and ask what spelling gives that sound, you will get it right.

Dropping the pronoun

Because the ending already says who is acting, the subject pronoun is usually dropped: parlo alone means “I speak”, and Abiti qui? needs no tu. You add io, tu and the rest for three reasons: to contrast (Io lavoro, tu dormi!, “I’m working, you’re sleeping!”), to be clear where the form alone is ambiguous (parla could be he, she or formal you), and for emphasis. Beginners over-use the pronoun because English requires it. Try to leave it out for a week.

What the present tense covers

The Italian present covers “I speak”, “I do speak”, “I am speaking” and, very often, the near future: Domani lavoro means “I’m working tomorrow”. It also covers actions that started in the past and are still going on, with da: Studio italiano da tre mesi, “I have been studying Italian for three months”.

To make a negative, put non before the verb: Non parlo tedesco. A question needs only a rising voice and a question mark: Parli inglese?. There is no helper like “do”, so “Do you speak English?” and “You speak English” differ in tone, not in words. With a question word, the subject usually goes after the verb: Dove lavora tua sorella?

A short exchange that uses nothing but what is on this page:

—Lavori qui? ▶	Do you work here?
—No, studio qui. Lavoro in un negozio. ▶	No, I study here. I work in a shop.
—E dove abiti? ▶	And where do you live?
—Abito vicino. Pranziamo insieme? ▶	I live nearby. Shall we have lunch together?

Where the stress falls

In io, tu, lui and loro the stress sits on the stem: PAR-lo, PAR-li, PAR-la, PAR-la-no. In noi and voi it moves to the ending: par-LIA-mo, par-LA-te. The loro form trips English speakers, because it is stressed on the same syllable as io, not on the ending: PAR-la-no, not “par-LA-no”. With a verb whose stem is long, that can be four syllables from the end: a-BI-ta-re gives A-bi-to and A-bi-ta-no; te-le-fo-NA-re gives te-LE-fo-no and te-LE-fo-na-no. No accent mark is written; you learn the io form and the rest follows.

Train the forms: the conjugation trainer

A prompt appears, such as noi · parlare · to speak, and you type the form. A wrong or revealed form comes back sooner (after about three questions, and again after about nine), and forms you keep getting right come up less and less often. Switch the verb families on and off with the first row of buttons; start with -are, then add the others. The note after each answer explains the pattern behind the form.

Common mistakes

• Leaving the infinitive. Io parlare is what a beginner says; the verb has to change: parlo.
• Mixing the families. Prenda is not the present of prendere (that is prende); -are verbs take a in parla, parlano, and -ere and -ire verbs take e and o.
• Forgetting -isc-, or adding it to noi. Capo for “I understand” is wrong (it is capisco; capo means “boss”), and so is capisciamo (it is capiamo).
• Two i’s. Studii and mangii are wrong: studi, mangi. And cerci loses the k sound: cerchi.
• Using tu with everyone. With a stranger, a customer or an official, start with Lei and the third-person form: Scusi, Lei sa dov’è la stazione?
• Stressing the ending of loro. PAR-la-no, A-bi-ta-no, not “par-LA-no”.

Your next four days

Ten minutes a day, in this order: review the cards that are due, do the drill, then say two or three sentences aloud.

Day	Trainer	Say aloud
1	10 forms: -are only	Three things you do every day, with io dropped.
2	10 forms: add -ere	Three things a family member does.
3	10 forms: add -ire and -isc-	Ask a question with each of three different verbs, once with tu and once with Lei.
4	10 forms: all families mixed	Say the six forms of capire without looking.

What sticks

• A verb is a stem plus an ending; io ends in -o, tu in -i, noi in -iamo in every family.
• -are verbs use a in lui and loro (parla, parlano); -ere and -ire use e and o (prende, prendono).
• Many -ire verbs add -isc- in io, tu, lui and loro (capisco), never in noi and voi.
• Spelling changes keep the sound: cerchi, paghi, mangi, studi.
• The pronoun is usually dropped; use it to contrast or to be clear.
• Tu is informal, Lei (with the lei form) is formal, voi is for more than one person.
• One present covers “I speak”, “I am speaking” and often the near future; non makes it negative, and a rising voice makes a question.