Lesson 5: Reflexive Verbs

5.1

What are Reflexives?

Reflexive verbs – actions where the effect of the action falls back onto the subject or do‑er of the action – can be a tricky concept for learners. But don’t worry! They follow the same patterns you’ve already mastered, and they even come with built-in pronouns to help you keep track of who’s doing what.

Let’s look at a quick example with a familiar verb: hablar (to talk).

Notice the difference? That little "te" makes it reflexive—it shows that the action is bouncing back to the subject.

You'll often see reflexive verbs written in their infinitive form as infinitive + "se", like hablarse. Now, let’s dive into how to form them!

5.2

Let’s look at the general formation of reflexive verbs.

1. Remove the reflexive pronoun from the infinitive and put it in front. Se is sort of a placeholder here in the infinitive, so don’t worry–we’ll deal with it in due time.

2. Conjugate the verb as normal according to the subject pronoun. The reflexive formation works with any tense or mood. 

3. Choose the correct reflexive pronoun in the table below to match the subject pronoun. Remember, they need to match!

Take a look at the translations here; they all work a little differently! Yo me baño gives us a pretty direct translation to English: I bathe myself. Lots of verbs related to one’s daily routine work this way. But aburrirse and comerse work a little differently:

A lot of the Spanish reflexive verbs translate to English phrasal verbs with get, and many other verbs, like comer, while not literally reflexive, can use the reflexive form to increase the intensity of the action being done.

This is a pretty simple explanation–just enough to get you practicing. You will see more examples as you study with VerbMaster.

5.4

Reflexives in Action

For the reflexive example sentences, we will show you reflexive forms of the verb compared to their non-reflexive forms to highlight how simple they can be.