Conjugating the Irregular Spanish Verb Traer (to Bring)

Spanish verbs fall into different groups, and each group is conjugated a little differently. If you’re going to master Spanish verbs like traer, you need to be able to identify which group a verb belongs to: regular (follows regular conjugation rules for -ar, -er, and -ir verbs), stem-changing (morphs depending on how you use it in a sentence), spelling-changing (has consonant-spelling changes in some forms to follow pronunciation rules), or reflexive (reflects the action back on the subject of the sentence).

In the present tense, traer (trah-ehr) (to bring) has an irregular yo form, but otherwise it conjugates like a regular -er verb. Here’s the present tense conjugation:

The following examples show you traer in action:

• Traigo flores para ti. (I bring flowers for you.)

• Traemos muchas revistas. (We bring a lot of magazines.)

In the preterit, traer is completely irregular. Take a look:

You use the preterit tense like this:

• Él trajo sus libros a la biblioteca. (He brought his books to the library.)

• ¿Trajiste tu terno? (Did you bring your suit?)

You’re off the hook with the stem change in the imperfect and future forms; traer conjugates normally in these tenses. Check out the following tables and examples.

Here are some examples of the imperfect tense:

• ¿Traían ustedes sus libros a la clase? (Did you used to bring your books to class?)

• Sí. Los traímos a la clase. (Yes. We used to bring them to class.)

The following samples put the future tense to work:

• Ellos traerán sus quejas. (They will bring their complaints.)

• Tú y yo traeremos nuestras soluciones. (You and I will bring our solutions.)