Spanish Reflexive Verbs (2024)

FAQs

What are the rules for reflexive verbs in Spanish? ›

Identify the reflexive verb's infinitive form (e.g., “bañarse,” to bathe oneself). Drop the reflexive ending “-se” and conjugate the verb according to its subject. Place the appropriate reflexive pronoun before the conjugated verb. For instance, “Yo me baño” (I bathe myself) or “Tú te bañas” (You bathe yourself).

Reflexive verbs “reflect” the action back upon oneself, meaning that the person performing the action is also the one receiving it.

3. Infinitive verbs. As you now know, reflexive verbs in the infinitive form always end in -se. So, you won't have to worry about using a reflexive pronoun anywhere else when you're dealing with an infinitive form of a reflexive verb.

Identify the reflexive pronoun that agrees with the subject (me, te, se, nos, os, se). Remove the -se ending from the infinitive form of the verb.

A reflexive verb, simply put, is when both the subject AND the object of a sentence are the SAME. Essentially, a person is performing the action on oneself.

The reflexive form of I eat, in Spanish, is “Comerse”. But, to conjugate it, we have to remove the reflexive pronoun -se and put it before the verb. Then, we would have “Yo se comer”. Comer, on the other hand, is the infinitive form of the verb.

Reflexive pronouns are used with verbs to talk about actions like “l wash myself,” in which the person doing and receiving the action is the same. Certain verbs in Spanish like lavar (to wash) or llamar (to call) can become reflexive by adding reflexive pronouns: lavarse (to wash oneself) or llamarse (to call oneself).

To shave (oneself). To take a bath. To get tired. To get married.

A reflexive verb is a verb which has a self-referential pronoun, either next to it or attached to it. A self-referential pronoun means that the subject of the verb and the pronoun are the same. Essentially, in some cases, you can think of it like the English “self”.

What is the reflexive verb to take a shower in Spanish? ›

The Spanish verb ducharse is a reflexive verb that means to shower or to take a shower.

Pronominal verbs have a reflexive pronoun that refers back to the subject, and that reflexive pronoun represents either the direct object or the indirect object of the verb. Here's the tricky part: Agreement is only required when the reflexive pronoun is a direct object.

The "backwards verbs" (gustar, encantar, interesar, etc) are not reflexive verbs. Reflexive verbs are those that use a reflexive pronoun (me, te, se, nos, os, se). With a reflexive verb, the subject and the object are the same; the subject performs an action on himself/herself.

Always reflexive: A small number of Spanish verbs are always reflexive, including quejarse de (to complain about), darse cuenta de (to realize), and arrepentirse (to repent).

Venir can be used with gerunds to indicate continuous action. The reflexive venirse can be used to emphasize the origins of where someone is coming from or to emphasize the suddenness of an action.

In the passé composé

Reflexive verbs use être as the auxiliary verb to form the passé composé, not avoir. If the reflexive pronoun is the direct object the past participle agrees in gender and number with it. The reflexive pronoun preceeds the auxiliary verb directly.

The most common option is for the reflexive pronouns to be placed directly onto the end of an infinitive verb: Tengo que bañarme. – I have to bathe myself.

Let's look at llamarse since you will probably already recognize its conjugations. Reflexive verbs have two parts that need to be conjugated, the infinitive (llamar) and the reflexive pronoun 'se. ' In this form, llamarse means 'to call oneself. '

In Spanish, verbs must be conjugated to match the subject pronoun – meaning that there are different forms of each verb depending on who is doing the action. For example, the verb "comer" (to eat) would be conjugated as "yo como," "tú comes," "él/ella come," etc., depending on the subject pronoun.