Ami means “to love”: to feel deep affection for a person, strong attachment to a place or cause, or great enjoyment of an activity. It is a regular transitive verb, so the loved person or thing is a direct object. Esperanto uses the same grammar across romantic, familial, and broader senses; context supplies the kind of love.
The complete paradigm
The stem am- combines regularly with all six verb endings. As with every Esperanto verb, the finite form is identical for all persons and numbers.
| Form | Core value | Typical translation |
|---|---|---|
| ami | infinitive | to love |
| amas | present | love, loves |
| amis | past | loved |
| amos | future | will love |
| amus | conditional | would love |
| amu | volitive | love!, let … love |
Mi amas vin, kaj mi volas konstrui vivon kun vi.
I love you, and I want to build a life with you.
Ŝi amis sian avinon kaj vizitis ŝin ĉiusemajne.
She loved her grandmother and visited her every week.
Amu vian proksimulon kiel vin mem.
Love your neighbor as yourself.
The volitive amu is natural in moral exhortations, blessings, slogans, and direct encouragement, but people do not normally command spontaneous romantic feeling. Amus expresses love under a condition or in an imagined situation; it is not the past tense.
Mi amus loĝi apud la maro, se mi povus labori de tie.
I would love to live by the sea if I could work from there.
A person or thing as direct object
The normative frame is ami iun aŭ ion. The object takes accusative -n, including on its agreeing adjectives and pronouns. The Akademio has explicitly confirmed this ordinary direct-object construction: a preposition such as al must not be inserted simply because another language uses one.
La gepatroj amas ĉiujn siajn infanojn egale.
The parents love all their children equally.
Ĉu vi ankoraŭ amas tiun urbon? — Jes, malgraŭ ĉiuj ĝiaj ŝanĝoj.
Do you still love that city? — Yes, despite all its changes.
People are the most obvious objects, but ami can also take a country, language, craft, idea, or way of life. This broader use is natural, just as English can say “love jazz” or “love the mountains.” It remains emotionally stronger than neutral ŝati “like/appreciate.”
Li amas ĵazon, precipe la koncertojn kun libera improvizado.
He loves jazz, especially concerts with free improvisation.
You can add the reason for affection with pro. The pro-phrase does not replace the direct object.
Mi amas ŝin pro ŝia kuraĝo, ne pro ŝia famo.
I love her for her courage, not for her fame.
The grammar therefore differs from verbs such as plaĉi, whose experiencer follows al. With ami, the lover is subject and the beloved is object: Mi amas ŝin.
Loving an activity
An infinitive can name the loved activity. Its understood subject is normally the subject of ami.
Ni amas kuiri kune dimanĉe kaj inviti amikojn.
We love cooking together on Sundays and inviting friends over.
Ŝi amas vojaĝi trajne, ĉar ŝi povas legi dumvoje.
She loves traveling by train because she can read on the way.
English permits either “love doing” or “love to do.” Esperanto uses the ordinary -i infinitive in both cases. Do not add a preposition before it. An infinitive is not marked with accusative -n, even though it fills the semantic role of what is loved.
For a complete state of affairs with its own subject, a ke-clause is possible: Mi amas, ke nia familio ankoraŭ kunvenas ĉiuvintre “I love that our family still gets together every winter.” Because the speaker evaluates a real fact, the clause normally has an indicative verb.
Loving, liking, and not loving
Ami expresses a deeper or more emphatic positive feeling than ŝati. For a restaurant, a song, or a colleague, either may be possible, but the choice changes intensity. Mi ŝatas tiun restoracion is an ordinary favorable judgment; Mi amas tiun restoracion is enthusiastic. With a romantic partner, ami is normally the intended verb.
Negation also matters. Ne ami means “not love” or “no longer love”; malami means “hate.” Absence of love is not automatically active hostility.
Mi ne amas tiun laboron, sed mi ankaŭ ne malamas ĝin.
I don’t love that job, but I don’t hate it either.
Ŝi malamas, kiam homoj parolas dum la filmo.
She hates it when people talk during the film.
Reciprocal love uses unu la alian, with the second expression marked as the object.
Post kvardek jaroj ili ankoraŭ amas unu la alian.
After forty years, they still love each other.
Reflexive sin points back to the clause subject: Oni devas lerni ami sin “One has to learn to love oneself.” These pronoun choices follow general Esperanto syntax, not special rules of ami.
Ekami: coming to love
The prefix ek- marks the beginning or sudden onset of an action or state. Ekami therefore means “begin to love,” “come to love,” or in a suitable romantic context “fall in love with.” It remains transitive and takes an accusative object.
Dum la longa vojaĝo ŝi ekamis la trankvilon de la kamparo.
During the long journey, she came to love the peace of the countryside.
Ili ekamis unu la alian dum komuna volontula projekto.
They fell in love with each other during a shared volunteer project.
This form illustrates productive word formation: ek- contributes the onset, while am- keeps its meaning and object pattern. It is not an irregular past or a separate conjugation. The broader behavior of the prefix is covered under ek-.
Participles and related words
Because ami is transitive, it permits the active series amanta, aminta, amonta and the passive series amata, amita, amota. The participles combine the time relation of -ant-/-int-/-ont- or -at-/-it-/-ot- with an ordinary word ending.
The most frequent form is amata, “being loved” or simply “beloved.” It describes a continuing relationship or current status. Amita presents the loving as completed or viewed retrospectively; amota predicts a future patient and is rare because a relative clause is usually more natural.
Ŝi estis amata instruistino, kiun ekslernantoj ofte vizitis.
She was a beloved teacher whom former students often visited.
La infano sentis sin amata kaj sekura.
The child felt loved and safe.
Useful derivatives include amo “love,” amanto “lover or one who loves,” amato “beloved person,” aminda “lovable,” amema “affectionate/loving by disposition,” and malami “hate.” These are transparent members of one family, although context decides whether amanto has a romantic or sexual implication.
Ilia amema hundo ĉiam salutas gastojn ĉe la pordo.
Their affectionate dog always greets guests at the door.
Frequency and register
Ami and its common finite forms are neutral in both conversation and writing. The verb can sound emotionally strong, but it is not restricted to a formal, literary, or romantic register. Amu appears especially often in proverbs, ethical language, and slogans; this distribution reflects meaning, not an irregular grammatical status. Ekami, amata, amo, and aminda are established everyday formations. Elaborate forms such as amota are grammatical but infrequent.
Common Mistakes
Inserting al before the beloved
❌ Mi amas al vi.
Incorrect — the loved person is a direct object.
✅ Mi amas vin.
I love you.
Forgetting accusative agreement
❌ Ŝi amas sia malnova kvartalo.
Incorrect — the entire object phrase needs accusative agreement.
✅ Ŝi amas sian malnovan kvartalon.
She loves her old neighborhood.
Adding a preposition before an activity
❌ Ili amas de danci kune.
Incorrect — an activity complement is a bare infinitive.
✅ Ili amas danci kune.
They love dancing together.
Confusing absence of love with hatred
❌ Mi malamas la proponon — ĝi estas bona, sed mi ne entuziasmas.
Too strong — malami means hate, not merely fail to love.
✅ Mi ne amas la proponon — ĝi estas bona, sed mi ne entuziasmas.
I don’t love the proposal—it is good, but I’m not enthusiastic.
Adding an English-style auxiliary
❌ Li estas amas sian familion.
Incorrect — amas is already a complete finite verb.
✅ Li amas sian familion.
He loves his family.
Key Takeaways
Use ami + accusative object for the person, thing, place, or cause loved, and ami + infinitive for an activity. Ŝati is usually milder; malami is stronger than simple ne ami. Every form belongs to a regular system, including amus for conditional love, amata for “loved/beloved,” and ekami for the beginning of love.
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- Likes and PreferencesB2 — Express liking, attraction, favorites, and choices with ŝati, plaĉi, preferi, and related everyday frames.
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- mal-: OppositesA2 — Form direct opposites with productive mal-, distinguish opposition from simple negation, and interpret its scope in larger derived words.
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