Beyond the grammatical futures (voi merge, o să merg, am să merg), Romanian has a rich set of lexical ways to talk about what lies ahead — phrases that pin down intention, scheduling, or imminence with a precision the bare future cannot. English packs much of this onto a single overworked phrase, "going to." Romanian instead distributes the work across several distinct expressions, and choosing the right one is a matter of meaning, not grammar.
a avea de gând să — to intend to
This is the workhorse for intention — a plan formed in the mind, something you mean to do. Gând means "thought" and the phrase literally says "to have the thought of": am de gând să... = "I intend to...". The auxiliary a avea inflects for person; de gând is fixed; the verb goes in the conjunctiv.
| Person | Form |
|---|---|
| eu | am de gând să |
| tu | ai de gând să |
| el / ea | are de gând să |
| noi | avem de gând să |
| voi | aveți de gând să |
| ei / ele | au de gând să |
Am de gând să mă mut la Cluj anul viitor.
I intend to move to Cluj next year.
Ce ai de gând să faci după facultate?
What do you intend to do after university?
Nu aveau de gând să rămână mult.
They didn't intend to stay long.
A near-synonym is a-și propune să (to set oneself the goal of), slightly more deliberate and formal: Mi-am propus să fac mai mult sport.
a urma să — to be due to / be going to (scheduled)
A urma literally means "to follow," and urmează să... frames the future event as the next thing on the timeline — scheduled, expected, or impending by arrangement. It is the natural choice for appointments, programmes, and "what happens next."
Urmează să plecăm la ora cinci.
We're due to leave at five.
Filmul urmează să apară în cinematografe luna viitoare.
The film is set to come out in cinemas next month.
Pacientul urmează să fie operat mâine.
The patient is scheduled to be operated on tomorrow.
Note that urmează is most often used impersonally in the third person, even with a plural or first-person logical subject: urmează să plecăm. It can also inflect (urmez să..., urmezi să...) but the fixed urmează să is by far the most idiomatic.
a fi pe cale să — to be about to (imminence)
A fi pe cale să (literally "to be on the path/way to") expresses imminence — the action is on the very brink of happening. It is more vivid and immediate than urmează să.
Sunt pe cale să termin, mai am puțin.
I'm about to finish, just a little more to go.
Era pe cale să spună ceva, dar s-a oprit.
He was about to say something, but he stopped.
Compania e pe cale să dea faliment.
The company is on the verge of going bankrupt.
A close colloquial alternative for imminence is gata-gata să ("almost, on the point of"): Gata-gata să cad — "I almost fell."
The plain present with a time adverb
For a scheduled near future, Romanian very often just uses the present indicative plus a time word — mâine (tomorrow), diseară (tonight), săptămâna viitoare (next week), peste o oră (in an hour). This is identical to the English "I leave tomorrow" pattern and is extremely common in speech.
Plec mâine dimineață la București.
I'm leaving for Bucharest tomorrow morning.
Diseară venim și noi la petrecere.
We're coming to the party tonight too.
Săptămâna viitoare începe noul proiect.
The new project starts next week.
Choosing the right tool
| You mean... | Use | Example |
|---|---|---|
| A plain, neutral future | o să + conjunctiv | O să plec mâine. |
| A formed intention / plan | a avea de gând să | Am de gând să plec. |
| Something scheduled / impending | a urma să | Urmează să plec. |
| Something on the very brink | a fi pe cale să | Sunt pe cale să plec. |
| A fixed near event (with adverb) | present + time word | Plec mâine. |
The big-picture insight for English speakers
English overloads "going to" with several jobs at once: neutral prediction ("it's going to rain"), intention ("I'm going to learn Romanian"), and imminence ("watch out, you're going to fall"). Romanian has no single grammaticalised "going-to" future — crucially, there is no construction built on a merge (to go) the way Spanish builds ir a or English builds "going to." Instead, Romanian splits the load by meaning:
- neutral prediction → o să
- intention → a avea de gând să
- imminence → a fi pe cale să / a urma să
So the single most important habit to break is reaching for a literal "go"-based future. Decide what you actually mean and pick the matching expression.
Common Mistakes
❌ Merg să învăț româna.
Incorrect for 'I'm going to learn Romanian' — this only means literally 'I go in order to study.'
✅ Am de gând să învăț româna. / O să învăț româna.
I'm going to learn Romanian.
❌ Am de gând plec mâine.
Incorrect — 'de gând' must be followed by 'să' + conjunctiv, not a bare verb.
✅ Am de gând să plec mâine.
I intend to leave tomorrow.
❌ Sunt pe cale termin.
Incorrect — 'pe cale' also requires 'să' + conjunctiv.
✅ Sunt pe cale să termin.
I'm about to finish.
❌ Urmez să plecăm la cinci.
Awkward — with a 1pl meaning the idiomatic form is the impersonal 'urmează'.
✅ Urmează să plecăm la cinci.
We're due to leave at five.
Key Takeaways
- Romanian distributes "going to" across distinct expressions: a avea de gând să (intention), a urma să (scheduled/impending), a fi pe cale să (imminence).
- For a plain future, default to o să; for a fixed near event, the present + time adverb is perfectly natural.
- There is no a merge-based future — never translate "going to" with a literal "go."
- All these periphrases take să + conjunctiv, never a bare verb.
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Start learning Romanian→Related Topics
- The Colloquial Future (o să + conjunctiv)A2 — How to form and use the everyday spoken future with invariable 'o' plus 'să' and the conjunctive — the default future of conversational Romanian.
- The Romanian Futures: OverviewA2 — A map of Romanian's four ways to talk about the future — voi merge, o să merg, am să merg, and the bare present — and, crucially, which register each one belongs to.
- Future-in-the-PastB2 — How Romanian says 'was going to / would later' — reported and narrated future seen from a past vantage point, with urma să as the cleanest idiomatic device.
- Conjunctiv After Modals: a putea, a trebui, a vreaA2 — How modal and control verbs (a vrea, a putea, a trebui, a încerca, a reuși, a spera) force a să-clause where English uses an infinitive, and the one verb that still tolerates the infinitive.
- Uses of the Present IndicativeA2 — The full range of the Romanian present — ongoing, habitual, general truths, scheduled future, narration — and why there is no continuous tense.