Conjugation of sentir

Sentir covers two English perception verbs: “hear” and “feel.” It takes a direct object in sentir un soroll “hear a noise” and sentir fred “feel cold.” Pronominal sentir-se instead describes the subject's state: em sento tranquil “I feel calm.” The morphology is easier than the range of meanings: sentir is a regular pure third-conjugation verb, not an incoative verb.

Its useful principal parts are sentir – sento – senti – sent – sentit. They show that there is no -eix- extension: the present is sento, sents, sent..., the subjunctive is senti..., the imperative is sent, and the participle is sentit. Neither plain sentir nor sentir-se is defective; both occur throughout the paradigm.

Nonfinite forms

Compound tenses use haver + sentit: he sentit, m'he sentit. With the pronominal verb, the weak pronoun goes before the finite auxiliary. The participle normally remains sentit in these perfect forms; feminine and plural forms are chiefly adjectival or occur where participial agreement is separately licensed.

The wider placement pattern is explained in the guide to pronominal verbs.

Indicative: simple and periphrastic tenses

The periphrastic past is the ordinary conversational completed past. The simple past is (formal/literary) in much of the Central area, though it remains alive in some regional speech. Present sentim and sentiu have stress on the ending; future sentirem and sentireu are distinguished by context and stress.

Indicative compound tenses

The past anterior is (formal/literary). The periphrastic anterior is vaig haver sentit, vas haver sentit, va haver sentit, vam haver sentit, vau haver sentit, van haver sentit.

Subjunctive and imperative

The periphrastic subjunctive series is (regional/formal). The affirmative sent is easy to confuse in writing with third-person present sent; only syntax and intonation distinguish “feel/hear!” from “he/she feels/hears.”

Meaning, syntax, and weak pronouns

Plain sentir is transitive in its core auditory use: sentir una veu, sentir el timbre, sentir música. Catalan does not add a preposition corresponding to English to: sentir la ràdio, not sentir a la ràdio when the radio is the thing heard. The direct-object pronoun is therefore straightforward: No he sentit l'avís → No l'he sentit. Neuter ho replaces a clause or an unspecific thing heard.

By contrast, sentir-hi uses lexical hi to describe the ability to hear, especially whether someone's hearing works well. Compare No sento el timbre “I don't hear the doorbell,” where el timbre is a direct object, with No hi sento gaire “I don't hear very well.”

For physical sensations and emotions, Catalan often uses plain sentir plus a noun—sentir gana, fred, dolor, vergonya—but sentir-se + adjective/adverb for the subject's overall condition: sentir-se cansat, sentir-se bé. English “feel” hides this structural contrast. The apology ho sento literally uses neuter ho and is fixed; em sap greu is another very common way to apologize.

The characteristic construction sentir a parlar de means “hear of/about”: n'he sentit a parlar, with en replacing the complement introduced by de. Do not transfer that de to a plain auditory object. Sentir dir que means “hear it said/hear that,” normally without a.

(Regional: Valencian) sent may occur as the first-person present indicative, and imperfect subjunctives in -ira (sentira, sentires...) are standard. (Regional: Balearic) forms such as first-person sent and plural sentim, sentiu belong to a coherent local system. The Central table above is the teaching baseline; do not mix isolated regional endings. No variety licenses an incoative senteixo for standard sentir.

Common Mistakes

Key Takeaways

Memorize the compact family sentir – sento – senti – sent – sentit: it blocks the invented incoative stem. Use plain sentir with sounds, sensations, and emotion nouns; use sentir-se for the subject's condition. Haver + sentit builds every compound form, and weak pronouns precede the finite auxiliary.