Commands / Imperative

To form commands, drop the final -s on the present tense conjugation for the tú form and change the final -r of the infinitive to -d for the vosotros form.  The other imperative conjugations (for Usted, Ustedes, and nosotros) use the present subjunctive forms. (More about the Subjunctive at #70.) You use the nosotros form when you mean Let's + infinitive. Negative commands use no + the present subjunctive conjugations for all forms. So the only forms that differ between affirmative and negative commands are tú and vosotros. Verbs that end in -car, -gar and -zar have the following changes in commands as well:  c becomes qu, g becomes gu, and z becomes c.

	Affirmative			Negative
	-ar	-er or -ir		-ar	-er or -ir
tú	-a	-e		-es	-as
Usted	-e	-a		-e	-a
nosotros	-emos	-amos		-emos	-amos
vosotros	-ad	-ed / -id		-éis	-áis
Ustedes	-en	-an		-en	-an

Habla!  = Speak!  (tú form)
Comed! = Eat!  (vosotros form)
No comáis! = Don't eat!  (negative vosotros form)
Beba! = Drink!  (Usted form)
Coman! = Eat (Ustedes form)
No beban! = Don't drink! (negative Ustedes form)
There are 8 irregular verbs in the imperative, but they are only irregular for the tú form. The rest of the commands follow the pattern above.

infinitive	tú form
decir hacer ir poner salir ser tener venir	di haz ve pon sal sé ten ven

There are several irregular stems that appear in the present subjunctive, and therefore in the imperative.

infinitive	imperative stem
dar	d-
decir	dig-
estar	est-
haber	hay-
hacer	hag-
ir	vay-
poder	pued-
poner	pong-
querer	quier-
saber	sep-
salir	salg-
ser	se-
tener	teng-
traer	traig-
venir	veng-

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