Verbs Like Gustar: Gustar, Encantar, Doler, Faltar, and More

“I like chocolate.” “She loves dogs.” “My feet hurt.”

These sentences seem straightforward in English. But Spanish often builds them differently, using verbs like gustar, encantar, and doler.

Instead of making the person who feels something the subject, Spanish often makes the thing causing the feeling the subject.

Once you understand that switch, an entire family of useful Spanish verbs starts to make sense.

Let’s start with a familiar example:

Literally, the Spanish structure is closer to “Chocolate is pleasing to me.”

That helps explain the two important parts of the sentence:

• Me identifies who likes something.
• Gusta agrees with what’s being liked: el chocolate.

Now compare:

The person doing the liking hasn’t changed. Only the thing being liked has changed from singular to plural.

Gusta vs. Gustan

For everyday sentences with gustar, you’ll most often use:

That last example is important. When what you like is an activity expressed with an infinitive, use singular gusta.

And even when you mention two activities together, the verb normally remains singular:

Never choose gusta or gustan based on how many people are doing the liking. Look at what’s being liked.

Gustar Can Have Other Conjugations

Gustar is a regular -ar verb, and its other forms are useful too.

These aren’t exceptions. The verb still agrees with the person or thing being liked. We focus on gusta and gustan first because they’re the forms you’ll encounter most often.

The next question is who likes, loves, or is affected by something.

Spanish uses indirect object pronouns to identify that person.

Notice that the pronoun changes according to who experiences the feeling, while the verb changes according to what causes it.

The subject (los perros) stays plural, so gustan stays the same. Only the person experiencing the liking changes.

Emphasizing Who

When comparing people’s opinions, Spanish can add phrases like a mí (to me) or a ella (to her) to emphasize who feels differently.

Imagine two friends discussing chocolate:

Juan uses a mí to emphasize that his opinion is different from Ana’s.

You can express the same contrast in a single sentence:

The extra phrases a ella and a mí highlight whose preferences we’re comparing.

Clarifying Who

We can also use a + person to clarify exactly who is experiencing the feeling. For example:

The pronoun le tells us that someone likes chocolate, but it doesn’t identify that person by itself. We usually know who from the conversation, but we can add a name when we want to be specific.

Why the a? Remember that gustar works more like “to be pleasing.” The phrase a María means roughly “to María,” identifying who experiences the liking.

And why do we still need le? Because adding a name doesn’t replace the indirect object pronoun. Spanish uses both together:

That’s why we say A María le gusta bailar, not A María gusta bailar.

Changing the Word Order

So far, we’ve usually put the person experiencing the feeling first. But Spanish can also start with the thing causing it.

Both are correct. Putting los días fríos first draws more attention to what we’re talking about.

The word order changes, but the grammar doesn’t: gustan still agrees with los días fríos, and me still identifies who likes them.

Negatives and Questions

You can make negative statements and ask questions with gustar without changing the basic construction.

To make a sentence negative, place no before the indirect object pronoun:

To ask a question, use the same pronoun and verb pattern, with question marks:

In both cases, the verb still agrees with what’s being liked, not with the person experiencing the feeling.

The same construction appears with many other Spanish verbs. And once you know how gustar works, much of the grammar is already familiar.

Likes, Interests, and Preferences

These verbs are useful for talking about what you enjoy, find interesting, or care about.

Encantar (to love / delight)

Interesar (to interest)

Importar (to matter / care about)

Notice how naturally English switches between “I love,” “she’s interested,” and “it matters to us.” Spanish can express all three using the same basic construction.

Boredom, Annoyance, and Other Reactions

The pattern also works for things that cause unpleasant feelings.

Aburrir (to bore)

Molestar (to bother)

Both describe something causing a reaction in someone. In these examples, the thing causing the reaction determines the verb’s singular or plural form.

More Ways to Express Feelings

A few other useful verbs work with this pattern:

Fascinar and agradar are especially close in meaning to encantar and gustar. Apetecer is particularly common in Spain when talking about what someone feels like doing or having.

These verbs share the same useful pattern, but they don’t all mean the same thing. Understanding the meaning of each verb is just as important as choosing its correct form.

Because gustar uses pronouns like me, te, and nos, it can look similar to reflexive verbs. But gustar isn’t reflexive. Compare:

In the first sentence, las galletas are the subject, and me identifies who likes them. In the second, I’m performing an action on myself. That’s a reflexive construction.

Aburrir vs. Aburrirse

Some verbs can appear in both constructions, but their meanings shift.

Both are correct, but the grammatical structure is different.

For these Context Drills, the focus is on the gustar-like construction, not reflexive conjugations. The Reflexive Verbs lesson covers those patterns separately.

Not every verb in this family describes likes or feelings. Some express physical pain, things we need or have left over, and even how difficult we find something.

They follow the same familiar pattern: the verb agrees with what’s causing the experience, not with the person experiencing it.

Doler: To Hurt

Doler works like gustar, but it changes its stem in the present tense.

Think about what’s hurting: one head or two feet. That’s what determines whether you use duele or duelen.

You can change who is experiencing the pain without changing the subject:

Faltar: To Be Missing / To Need

Use faltar when something is missing or needed.

English often puts the person first: “I’m missing three euros.” Spanish makes the missing euros the subject.

Faltar also works with an infinitive:

Quedar: To Have Left / Remain

Quedar can describe how much of something someone has left.

Compare it with faltar:

The same amount of money, but two very different situations.

Hacer Falta: To Be Needed

You’ll also hear hacer falta, another common way to express what someone needs.

Just as with gustar, the verb agrees with what’s needed, not with the person who needs it.

Sobrar: To Have Extra / Be Left Over

Sobrar is particularly useful because it’s the opposite of faltar.

Both use the same construction, but describe opposite situations.

Costar: To Be Difficult

Costar can express how difficult something is for someone.

Just like gustar, the verb agrees with the thing causing the difficulty, not the person experiencing it.