A aduce ("to bring") is a duce with the prefix a-, and it conjugates identically — a third-conjugation verb (short infinitive a aduce) with the short participle adus and the third-person subjunctive să aducă. The semantic flip introduced by the prefix is exactly the English "carry away / bring here" split: where a duce moves something away from the speaker, a aduce moves it toward the speaker. Du gunoiul afară ("take the rubbish out") versus Adu-mi un pahar cu apă ("bring me a glass of water").
Two things make this verb worth a page of its own. First, its singular imperative is the short, slightly surprising adu! Second, it anchors one of the most common idioms in the language: a-și aduce aminte ("to remember"), built on a dative reflexive plus the noun aminte. You will use that phrase constantly, so it pays to learn the verb and the idiom together.
Because a aduce is a duce with a prefix, you get its whole paradigm "for free" once you know the base verb — every tense, mood, and the irregular short imperative carry straight over, with only the unstressed a- added at the front. The tables below are therefore identical in shape to those of a duce; the value of having them here is seeing the direction of motion flip while the morphology stays put.
Prezent indicativ
| Person | Form |
|---|---|
| eu | aduc |
| tu | aduci |
| el / ea | aduce |
| noi | aducem |
| voi | aduceți |
| ei / ele | aduc |
Imperfect
| Person | Form |
|---|---|
| eu | aduceam |
| tu | aduceai |
| el / ea | aducea |
| noi | aduceam |
| voi | aduceați |
| ei / ele | aduceau |
Perfect compus
Auxiliary a avea plus the short participle adus.
| Person | Form |
|---|---|
| eu | am adus |
| tu | ai adus |
| el / ea | a adus |
| noi | am adus |
| voi | ați adus |
| ei / ele | au adus |
Mai-mult-ca-perfectul (pluperfect)
| Person | Form |
|---|---|
| eu | adusesem |
| tu | aduseseși |
| el / ea | adusese |
| noi | aduseserăm |
| voi | aduseserăți |
| ei / ele | aduseseră |
Viitor (future)
| Person | voi-future (formal) | o să-future (informal) |
|---|---|---|
| eu | voi aduce | o să aduc |
| tu | vei aduce | o să aduci |
| el / ea | va aduce | o să aducă |
| noi | vom aduce | o să aducem |
| voi | veți aduce | o să aduceți |
| ei / ele | vor aduce | o să aducă |
Conjunctiv prezent
The third person is irregular: să aducă (not să aduce).
| Person | Form |
|---|---|
| eu | să aduc |
| tu | să aduci |
| el / ea | să aducă |
| noi | să aducem |
| voi | să aduceți |
| ei / ele | să aducă |
Condițional prezent
| Person | Form |
|---|---|
| eu | aș aduce |
| tu | ai aduce |
| el / ea | ar aduce |
| noi | am aduce |
| voi | ați aduce |
| ei / ele | ar aduce |
Imperativ
The singular imperative is the short adu! (mirroring du! from a duce), plural aduceți! With clitics it hooks them on: adu-mi! ("bring me!"), adu-ne! ("bring us!").
| Type | Singular (tu) | Plural (voi) |
|---|---|---|
| Affirmative | adu! | aduceți! |
| Affirmative + clitic | adu-mi! | aduceți-mi! |
| Negative | nu aduce! | nu aduceți! |
Non-finite forms
| Form | Romanian |
|---|---|
| Infinitive (short / long) | (a) aduce / aducere |
| Gerunziu | aducând |
| Participiu | adus |
| Supin | de adus |
Usage
The core sense — bringing something toward the speaker:
Adu-mi un pahar cu apă, te rog.
Bring me a glass of water, please.
Au adus vin și flori la cină.
They brought wine and flowers to dinner.
The idiom a-și aduce aminte ("to remember"), with a dative reflexive clitic. English collapses "remember" into one transitive verb; Romanian builds it from a dative reflexive (îmi, îți, își…) plus the verb plus the fixed noun aminte, so the person doing the remembering is marked in the dative — literally "to bring oneself to mind":
Nu-mi aduc aminte unde am pus cheile.
I can't remember where I put the keys.
Îți aduci aminte de profesoara noastră de română?
Do you remember our Romanian teacher?
Mi-am adus aminte abia acum de promisiune.
I only just remembered the promise.
The friendly greeting ce te aduce pe aici? ("what brings you here?"):
Ce te aduce pe aici la ora asta?
What brings you here at this hour?
The figurative "to bring about / cause":
Schimbarea asta a adus multe probleme.
This change brought about a lot of problems.
The supine de adus for "to be brought":
Mai e ceva de adus din mașină?
Is there anything else to bring in from the car?
The subjunctive after a request, showing să aducă:
Spune-i să aducă și laptopul.
Tell him to bring the laptop too.
Common Mistakes
❌ Aduce-mi cartea!
Incorrect — the singular imperative is the short adu, so it's adu-mi.
✅ Adu-mi cartea!
Bring me the book!
❌ Nu-mi aduc amintesc de el.
Incorrect — the idiom is a-și aduce aminte; aminte is a fixed noun, not a verb to be conjugated.
✅ Nu-mi aduc aminte de el.
I don't remember him.
❌ Am aducut florile.
Incorrect — the participle is the short adus, not *aducut.
✅ Am adus florile.
I brought the flowers.
❌ Adu gunoiul afară.
Wrong verb direction — taking something away from here is a duce, so it should be du.
✅ Du gunoiul afară.
Take the rubbish out.
❌ Vreau să aduce el desertul.
Incorrect — the 3rd-person subjunctive is aducă, not aduce.
✅ Vreau să aducă el desertul.
I want him to bring the dessert.
Now practice Romanian
Reading grammar gets you part of the way. The exercises are where it sticks — free, no signup needed.
Start learning Romanian→Related Topics
- a duce — to carry, to leadA2 — Full conjugation of a duce (to carry, to lead, to take somewhere), plus its essential reflexive a se duce, the colloquial everyday word for 'to go'.
- Class III Present: -e VerbsA2 — How to conjugate Class III (-e) verbs in the present indicative, with their stem stress, consonant alternations, and the irregularity-dense core verbs a face, a zice, and a duce.
- Dative Reflexive VerbsB1 — The dative reflexive clitics îmi, îți, își, ne, vă, își — verbs like a-și aminti and a-și dori that act on one's own mind or in one's own interest.
- Imperatives with Pronoun CliticsB1 — How object and reflexive clitics attach after affirmative imperatives with a hyphen, but move before negative ones.
- Frequent Irregular ParticiplesB1 — A frequency-ordered reference of the must-know irregular past participles — the small set of verbs that covers most spoken-past usage.