Three families, one system
So far you've learned specific verbs one at a time: essere and avere (Lesson 2), potere/dovere/volere (Lesson 3). Every Italian verb belongs to one of three families, named after its infinitive ending: -are, -ere, or -ire. Verbs in the same family that follow the predictable pattern are called regular — learn the pattern once, and it applies to hundreds of verbs at once. This lesson covers -are, the largest family by far (the vast majority of new verbs coined in Italian are -are verbs). Lesson 10 covers -ere, Lesson 11 covers -ire.
The regular pattern: parlare (to speak)
Strip the -are off the infinitive to get the stem (parl-), then add the ending for each person:
| Person | Ending | Form | Example |
|---|---|---|---|
| io (I) | -o | parlo | Parlo un po' di italiano. — I speak a little Italian. |
| tu (you, informal) | -i | parli | Parli inglese? — Do you speak English? |
| lui/lei/Lei (he/she/you-formal) | -a | parla | Parla piano, per favore. — Please speak slowly. |
| noi (we) | -iamo | parliamo | Parliamo italiano insieme. — We speak Italian together. |
| voi (you, plural) | -ate | parlate | Parlate troppo veloce! — You (all) speak too fast! |
| loro (they) | -ano | parlano | Parlano al telefono. — They're speaking on the phone. |
Every fully regular -are verb works exactly this way: abitare (to live/reside), lavorare (to work), comprare (to buy), guardare (to look at), telefonare (to phone), arrivare (to arrive), aspettare (to wait) — strip -are, add the six endings above.
Named exception: spelling-only changes (not real irregulars)
Two small families of -are verbs look irregular but aren't — the stem changes only to preserve how it sounds, following ordinary Italian spelling rules you'll see everywhere.
-care / -gare: insert an h before i
Italian c and g are hard (as in "cat," "go") before a, o, u, but soft (as in "cheese," "gem") before e, i. Verbs like cercare (to look for) and pagare (to pay) need an inserted h wherever the ending starts with i, purely to keep the hard sound:
| Person | cercare | pagare |
|---|---|---|
| io | cerco | pago |
| tu | cerchi | paghi |
| lui/lei/Lei | cerca | paga |
| noi | cerchiamo | paghiamo |
| voi | cercate | pagate |
| loro | cercano | pagano |
-ciare / -giare: drop the i before another i
The opposite problem: verbs like mangiare (to eat) already end their stem in a soft -i sound. Adding an ending that also starts with i would double it up, so the stem's i is simply dropped:
| Person | mangiare |
|---|---|
| io | mangio |
| tu | mangi |
| lui/lei/Lei | mangia |
| noi | mangiamo |
| voi | mangiate |
| loro | mangiano |
Not mangii, mangiiamo — the tu and noi forms simplify to a single i.
Named exception: four genuinely irregular -are verbs
These four don't follow the stem-plus-ending pattern at all and must be memorized whole. They're also four of the most-used verbs in the language, so the memorization pays off immediately.
| Person | andare (go) | dare (give) | stare (stay/be) | fare (do/make) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| io | vado | do | sto | faccio |
| tu | vai | dai | stai | fai |
| lui/lei/Lei | va | dà | sta | fa |
| noi | andiamo | diamo | stiamo | facciamo |
| voi | andate | date | state | fate |
| loro | vanno | danno | stanno | fanno |
Dà (he/she/it gives) carries an accent for the same reason è does (Lesson 2) — it distinguishes the verb from da, the preposition "from" (Lesson 8). Fare looks like an -are verb only in its infinitive; its stem comes from Latin facere, which is why faccio, facciamo, fanno don't resemble parlo, parliamo, parlano at all.
Stare is also worth flagging for meaning, not just form: alongside "to stay," it covers how you're doing — "Come stai?" "Sto bene." ("How are you?" "I'm well.") — a second, distinct way to use something that looks like "to be," alongside essere from Lesson 2.
A beginner-focused walkthrough of the three regular conjugation patterns with exercises.
Practice
Fill in the blank (io-form of parlare): "___ un po' di italiano." (I speak a little Italian.)
"Cosa ___ (tu, cercare)?" (What are you looking for?) — which keeps the hard c sound?
Fill in the blank (tu-form of mangiare): "Cosa ___ stasera?" (What are you eating tonight?)
"Dove ___ (tu)?" (Where are you going?) — andare is fully irregular here.
"Cosa ___ (noi, fare) stasera?" (What are we doing tonight?)
Fill in the blank: "Come stai?" "___ bene, grazie." (How are you? I'm well, thanks.)
→ Open the reference cheat sheet for this lesson.