Admirar Conjugation in Spanish
Introduction
admirar means "to admire" in English, and it is one of the verbs you will meet constantly in everyday Spanish — for expressing admiration for a person or a piece of work. Learning it properly means more than memorising one form: the verb changes across thirteen tenses, and this page gives you every one of them, with the exact forms from the VerbFlow engine, so you can check any person or tense in seconds. Admirar is a regular -ar verb verb, and it is regular in every tense. That matters because the patterns on this page are the patterns you will reuse every time you speak or write. Work through the tables first, then read the notes under each tense — they explain when to use each tense and what to watch out for with this verb in particular. A natural example is: Cada día, yo admiro a mi abuela por su paciencia. — "Every day, I admire my grandmother for her patience." Once you can say that sentence confidently, try changing the person and the tense using the tables below.
Quick facts
| Infinitive | admirar |
| Translation | to admire |
| Verb type | Regular -ar verb |
| Gerund | admirando |
| Past participle | admirado |
| Auxiliary | haber (all compound tenses) |
| Irregular tenses | regular in every tense |
Full conjugation of admirar
Present indicative
| Person | Form |
|---|---|
| yo | admiro |
| tú | admiras |
| él / ella / Ud. | admira |
| nosotros / nosotras | admiramos |
| vosotros / vosotras | admiráis |
| ellos / ellas / Uds. | admiran |
Preterite
| Person | Form |
|---|---|
| yo | admiré |
| tú | admiraste |
| él / ella / Ud. | admiró |
| nosotros / nosotras | admiramos |
| vosotros / vosotras | admirasteis |
| ellos / ellas / Uds. | admiraron |
Imperfect
| Person | Form |
|---|---|
| yo | admiraba |
| tú | admirabas |
| él / ella / Ud. | admiraba |
| nosotros / nosotras | admirábamos |
| vosotros / vosotras | admirabais |
| ellos / ellas / Uds. | admiraban |
Future
| Person | Form |
|---|---|
| yo | admiraré |
| tú | admirarás |
| él / ella / Ud. | admirará |
| nosotros / nosotras | admiraremos |
| vosotros / vosotras | admiraréis |
| ellos / ellas / Uds. | admirarán |
Conditional
| Person | Form |
|---|---|
| yo | admiraría |
| tú | admirarías |
| él / ella / Ud. | admiraría |
| nosotros / nosotras | admiraríamos |
| vosotros / vosotras | admiraríais |
| ellos / ellas / Uds. | admirarían |
Present subjunctive
| Person | Form |
|---|---|
| yo | admire |
| tú | admires |
| él / ella / Ud. | admire |
| nosotros / nosotras | admiremos |
| vosotros / vosotras | admiréis |
| ellos / ellas / Uds. | admiren |
Imperfect subjunctive (-ra forms)
| Person | Form |
|---|---|
| yo | admirara |
| tú | admiraras |
| él / ella / Ud. | admirara |
| nosotros / nosotras | admiráramos |
| vosotros / vosotras | admirarais |
| ellos / ellas / Uds. | admiraran |
Present perfect
| Person | Form |
|---|---|
| yo | he admirado |
| tú | has admirado |
| él / ella / Ud. | ha admirado |
| nosotros / nosotras | hemos admirado |
| vosotros / vosotras | habéis admirado |
| ellos / ellas / Uds. | han admirado |
Pluperfect
| Person | Form |
|---|---|
| yo | había admirado |
| tú | habías admirado |
| él / ella / Ud. | había admirado |
| nosotros / nosotras | habíamos admirado |
| vosotros / vosotras | habíais admirado |
| ellos / ellas / Uds. | habían admirado |
Future perfect
| Person | Form |
|---|---|
| yo | habré admirado |
| tú | habrás admirado |
| él / ella / Ud. | habrá admirado |
| nosotros / nosotras | habremos admirado |
| vosotros / vosotras | habréis admirado |
| ellos / ellas / Uds. | habrán admirado |
Conditional perfect
| Person | Form |
|---|---|
| yo | habría admirado |
| tú | habrías admirado |
| él / ella / Ud. | habría admirado |
| nosotros / nosotras | habríamos admirado |
| vosotros / vosotras | habríais admirado |
| ellos / ellas / Uds. | habrían admirado |
Imperative — affirmative
| Person | Form |
|---|---|
| tú | admira |
| él / ella / Ud. | admire |
| nosotros / nosotras | admiremos |
| vosotros / vosotras | admirad |
| ellos / ellas / Uds. | admiren |
Imperative — negative
| Person | Form |
|---|---|
| tú | admires |
| él / ella / Ud. | admire |
| nosotros / nosotras | admiremos |
| vosotros / vosotras | admiréis |
| ellos / ellas / Uds. | admiren |
Gerund: admirando · Past participle: admirado
Admirar in every tense — notes and examples
Present indicative
The present is the tense for habits, facts and what is happening now. It is the first tense to master, because the present subjunctive and the affirmative imperative are both built from the present yo form. Example: Cada día, yo admiro a mi abuela por su paciencia. — "Every day, I admire my grandmother for her patience."
Preterite
The preterite is for completed actions in the past — things that started and finished at a definite moment. Use it for a single event, a sequence of events, or an action with a clear end. Example: Ayer, yo admiré a mi abuela por su paciencia. — "Yesterday, I admired my grandmother for her patience."
Imperfect
The imperfect is for the past without a definite end: habits, background scenes, descriptions and actions in progress when something else happened. It never states when the action finished. Example: Antes, yo admiraba a mi abuela por su paciencia. — "Before, I admired my grandmother for her patience."
Future
The future is for what will happen, and also for guesses about the present ("I wonder if…"). For regular verbs it is the infinitive plus the endings -é, -ás, -á, -emos, -éis, -án. Example: Mañana, yo admiraré a mi abuela por su paciencia. — "Tomorrow, I will admire my grandmother for her patience."
Conditional
The conditional is for what would happen — polite requests, hypothetical results and reported expectations. It shares its stem with the future, so any irregular future stem appears here too. Example: Yo admiraría a mi abuela por su paciencia si tuviera la oportunidad. — "I would admire my grandmother for her patience if I had the chance."
Present subjunctive
The present subjunctive is for wishes, doubts, emotions and other non-facts after que, and after expressions such as ojalá, es importante que or no creo que. It is not a tense for stating facts. Example: Espero que ella admire a mi abuela por su paciencia. — "I hope she will admire my grandmother for her patience."
Imperfect subjunctive (-ra forms)
The imperfect subjunctive (-ra forms) is for wishes and doubts about the past, and for the if-part of hypothetical sentences (si + imperfect subjunctive, conditional). This page shows the -ra forms from the engine. Example: Si ella admirara a mi abuela por su paciencia, todo cambiaría. — "If she admired my grandmother for her patience, everything would change."
Present perfect
The present perfect (haber + past participle) is for past actions connected to the present — recent events, experience, or something that has just happened. The auxiliary is always haber. Example: Yo he admirado el trabajo de los artesanos varias veces. — "I have admired the artisans' work several times."
Pluperfect
The pluperfect (había + past participle) is the past of the past: something that had already happened before another past event. Example: Yo había admirado a mi abuela por su paciencia antes de la reunión. — "I had admired my grandmother for her patience before the meeting."
Future perfect
The future perfect (habré + past participle) is for something that will already be finished by a future moment, or for a guess about the past. It is less common in speech than the simple future. Example: Para mañana, yo habré admirado a mi abuela por su paciencia. — "By tomorrow, I will have admired my grandmother for her patience."
Conditional perfect
The conditional perfect (habría + past participle) is for what would have happened — the past of the conditional, used for regrets and unreal past conditions. Example: Yo habría admirado a mi abuela por su paciencia si hubiera tenido tiempo. — "I would have admired my grandmother for her patience if I had had time."
Imperative — affirmative
The affirmative imperative is for direct orders, instructions and invitations. The tú form comes from the present él/ella form, and the formal, nosotros and plural forms come from the present subjunctive. Example: ¡admira a mi abuela por su paciencia! — "Admire my grandmother for her patience!"
Imperative — negative
The negative imperative (no + subjunctive) is for telling someone not to do something. All five persons come from the present subjunctive, which is why they look different from the affirmative tú form. Example: No admires a mi abuela por su paciencia. — "Do not admire my grandmother for her patience."
Example sentences with admirar
Yo admiro a mi abuela por su paciencia. — "I admire my grandmother for her patience."
¿Tú admiras el trabajo de los artesanos? — "Do you admire the artisans' work?"
Ayer, él admiró a mi abuela por su paciencia. — "Yesterday, he admired my grandmother for her patience."
Nosotros admiramos el trabajo de los artesanos a tiempo. — "We admired the artisans' work on time."
Antes, ellos admiraban a mi abuela por su paciencia. — "Before, they admired my grandmother for her patience."
Mañana, yo admiraré el trabajo de los artesanos. — "Tomorrow, I will admire the artisans' work."
Nosotros admiraríamos a mi abuela por su paciencia si pudiéramos. — "We would admire my grandmother for her patience if we could."
Yo he admirado el trabajo de los artesanos varias veces. — "I have admired the artisans' work several times."
Espero que ella admire a mi abuela por su paciencia. — "I hope she will admire my grandmother for her patience."
Ahora mismo, yo estoy admirando el trabajo de los artesanos. — "Right now, I am admiring the artisans' work."
Common mistakes with admirar
1. Dropping the accent on the preterite yo form
The preterite yo form is admiré — with the accent. Without it the word is misspelled, and in some verbs the accent is the only thing separating one tense from another.
2. Confusing admirar with respetar (to respect)
admirar means "to admire", while respetar means "to respect". They overlap in English but they are not interchangeable in Spanish: use admirar when you mean expressing admiration for a person or a piece of work, and respetar for its own meaning. Check the conjugation of respetar before choosing.
3. Mixing up the preterite and the imperfect
Ayer yo admiré a mi abuela por su paciencia (preterite: one finished event yesterday) is not the same as antes yo admiraba a mi abuela por su paciencia (imperfect: what used to happen). If you can add "yesterday" or "last week", you usually want the preterite; if you can add "used to", you want the imperfect.
4. Using estar instead of haber in the perfect tenses
The present perfect is he admirado (haber + participle), never estoy admirado. Haber is the only auxiliary for compound tenses in Spanish.
5. Dropping the preposition before the complement
admirar takes a here: yo admiro a mi abuela por su paciencia. Dropping the preposition (yo admiro mi abuela por su paciencia) sounds wrong to a native speaker, so learn the verb together with its preposition.
Quiz: admirar
1. Yo ___ a mi abuela por su paciencia.
a. admira b. admiro c. admiran
2. Ella ___ a mi abuela por su paciencia.
a. admiro b. admira c. admiran
3. Ayer, yo ___ a mi abuela por su paciencia.
a. admiro b. admiré c. admira
4. Ellos ___ a mi abuela por su paciencia ayer.
a. admiro b. admiraron c. admira
5. Antes, yo ___ a mi abuela por su paciencia.
a. admiro b. admiraba c. admira
6. Mañana, yo ___ a mi abuela por su paciencia.
a. admiro b. admiraré c. admira
7. Yo ___ a mi abuela por su paciencia si pudiera.
a. admiro b. admiraría c. admira
8. Espero que ella ___ a mi abuela por su paciencia.
a. admiro b. admire c. admira
9. Ahora mismo, yo estoy ___ el trabajo de los artesanos.
a. admirado b. admirando c. admiro
10. Yo he ___ el trabajo de los artesanos varias veces.
a. admirando b. admirado c. admiro
Answer key
admiro — present tense, yo form.
admira — present tense, él/ella form.
admiré — preterite, yo form — a finished action yesterday.
admiraron — preterite, ellos/ellas form.
admiraba — imperfect, yo form — a past habit.
admiraré — future, yo form.
admiraría — conditional, yo form — a hypothetical.
admire — present subjunctive after 'espero que'.
admirando — gerund — the progressive is estar + gerund.
admirado — past participle — the present perfect is haber + participle.
Frequently asked questions about admirar
What does admirar mean in English?
Admirar means "to admire". It is used for expressing admiration for a person or a piece of work. A simple example is yo admiro a mi abuela por su paciencia — "I admire my grandmother for her patience."
Is admirar regular or irregular?
Admirar is a regular -ar verb verb, and it is regular in every tense. The forms that most often catch learners out are the present yo form admiro, the preterite yo form admiré and the past participle admirado — learn those three first, then fill in the rest from the tables above.
What is the gerund and the past participle of admirar?
The gerund is admirando (used for the progressive: estoy admirando) and the past participle is admirado (used with haber in all perfect tenses: he admirado). Both forms are used constantly, so they are worth memorising on their own.
How do I say "I admire" in the past?
It depends on the meaning. For one finished action use the preterite: ayer yo admiré a mi abuela por su paciencia — "yesterday I admired my grandmother for her patience". For a past habit or background use the imperfect: antes yo admiraba a mi abuela por su paciencia — "before, I admired my grandmother for her patience". The mistake most learners make is using one for the other.
Does admirar take the subjunctive?
Not usually. Admirar on its own takes the indicative — yo admiro a mi abuela por su paciencia. You will meet the subjunctive with admirar only inside a larger construction that itself triggers it, such as no creo que or es importante que, and then the subjunctive form is admire.