Most Spanish relative clauses follow a noun: el libro que compré, la chica que conoces, el bar donde quedamos. But Spanish has a smaller, equally important construction where the relative clause stands alone — there is no antecedent noun, and the relative pronoun does double duty as both head and link. These are free relatives (also called headless relatives, relativas libres, or relativas sin antecedente), and they are the engine of Spanish proverbs, slogans, threats, promises, and everyday short-form expression.
You already use free relatives constantly without thinking about it: lo que tú digas ("whatever you say"), quien quiera, que venga ("whoever wants to, come along"), donde caben dos caben tres ("where two fit, three fit"). This page sets out the system: the four main free-relative pronouns, the mood they take, and the subtle but important difference between English "whoever / whatever / wherever" and the Spanish equivalents.
The four main free relatives
Spanish has four core free relatives, each corresponding to a question word:
| Free relative | Range | Rough English | Example |
|---|---|---|---|
| quien / quienes | people | whoever, the one who | Quien sepa la respuesta, que la diga. |
| lo que | things, ideas, situations | what, whatever | Haz lo que quieras. |
| donde | place | where, wherever | Iremos donde tú decidas. |
| cuando | time | when, whenever | Avísame cuando llegues. |
Two more — como (manner) and cuanto / cuantos (quantity) — also form free relatives, though their use is more restricted.
Quien / quienes — the personal free relative
Quien refers to people (one person), quienes to several. It is the only Spanish relative pronoun that can stand without an antecedent in all positions — subject, object, after a preposition.
Quien madruga, Dios le ayuda.
The early bird catches the worm. (Literally: God helps whoever rises early.)
Quienes quieran apuntarse al curso, que me manden un correo antes del viernes.
Whoever wants to sign up for the course, send me an email before Friday.
No me fío de quien promete demasiado.
I don't trust people who promise too much.
Habla con quien quieras, pero deja en paz a mi hermana.
Talk to whoever you want, but leave my sister alone.
In subject position, quien often introduces proverbs, generalisations, and aphoristic statements. The construction quien + present subjunctive ("whoever does X") is so common in proverbs that it has become a register marker — Spanish speakers will say quien sepa que lo diga in a meeting room without it sounding archaic, but the same speaker would write los que sepan que lo digan in an email to a client.
Quien requires the subjunctive when the referent is unidentified
When the person referred to is not yet known or has not yet been identified — a hypothetical, an open call — quien takes the present subjunctive. When the person is real and identified, it takes the indicative.
Quien gane la votación, presidirá la próxima reunión.
Whoever wins the vote will chair the next meeting.
Quien ganó la votación fue Marta, y por eso preside ahora ella.
The one who won the vote was Marta, and that's why she's the chair now.
The first refers to an unknown future winner — subjunctive. The second refers to Marta, identified — indicative.
Lo que — the neuter free relative
Lo que refers to things, ideas, statements, situations — anything that is not a person. It is by far the most frequent free relative in everyday speech and writing.
Lo que más me molesta es que no avisen con tiempo.
What annoys me most is that they don't give advance notice.
No entiendo lo que dijo el ministro en la rueda de prensa.
I don't understand what the minister said at the press conference.
Haz lo que te dé la gana.
Do whatever you feel like.
Lo que dijiste ayer me hizo pensar toda la noche.
What you said yesterday made me think all night.
Lo que takes the subjunctive when the referent is open or unspecified
The same logic as quien: a concrete known thing takes the indicative; a hypothetical or open-ended one takes the subjunctive. The contrast is especially clear in promises and threats.
Te daré lo que quieras.
I'll give you whatever you want. (you haven't said yet — subjunctive)
Te di lo que querías.
I gave you what you wanted. (specific past wish — indicative)
Acepto lo que decidas.
I accept whatever you decide. (future open decision — subjunctive)
Acepto lo que decidiste.
I accept what you decided. (past finished decision — indicative)
Todo lo que — universal quantifier
Prefixing todo converts the free relative into "everything that / all that". The mood logic is unchanged.
Te contaré todo lo que sé.
I'll tell you everything I know.
Estoy dispuesta a hacer todo lo que sea necesario.
I'm prepared to do whatever is necessary.
Donde — the locative free relative
Donde without an antecedent means "the place where" or "wherever". It can also be governed by prepositions (a donde, de donde, por donde, hacia donde) to express direction, origin, path, and so on.
Donde caben dos caben tres.
Where two fit, three fit. (proverb)
Iremos donde tú prefieras cenar.
We'll go wherever you'd rather have dinner.
No es de donde te criaste, es a donde llegas.
It's not where you grew up, it's where you end up.
Quédate donde estás, ahora mismo voy a por ti.
Stay where you are, I'll come get you right now.
Donde + subjunctive vs. indicative
A real, known location takes the indicative; an open or unspecified one takes the subjunctive.
Te espero donde quedamos siempre.
I'll wait for you where we always meet. (specific place — indicative)
Te espero donde tú me digas.
I'll wait for you wherever you tell me. (open place — subjunctive)
Cuando — the temporal free relative
Cuando without an antecedent functions as a temporal connector meaning "when" or "whenever". For habits and past events it takes the indicative; for unrealised future events it takes the subjunctive.
Cuando termine la peli, te llamo.
When the film ends, I'll call you. (future — subjunctive)
Cuando era pequeño, mis padres me llevaban a la playa todos los veranos.
When I was little, my parents took me to the beach every summer. (past habit — indicative)
Avísame cuando puedas, sin prisa.
Let me know when you can, no rush.
Cuando quieras, me dices y nos vemos.
Whenever you want, just tell me and we'll meet up.
Como and cuanto — the marginal free relatives
These two are less frequent but worth recognising.
Como — manner
Hazlo como te he enseñado.
Do it the way I've taught you. (known method — indicative)
Hazlo como quieras.
Do it however you want. (open method — subjunctive)
Como te portes mal, te quedas sin postre.
If you behave badly, you don't get dessert. (colloquial conditional 'como')
The colloquial como + subjunctive in the last example is a real-world conditional, common in Spain — si would also work, but como carries a slightly threatening edge.
Cuanto / cuanta / cuantos / cuantas — quantity
A more elevated alternative to todo lo que / todos los que. Common in journalism, contracts, and formal writing.
Cuantos quieran asistir a la conferencia deben inscribirse antes del lunes.
All those who wish to attend the lecture must register before Monday. (formal)
Te daré cuanto necesites.
I'll give you all you need.
El testimonio aporta cuanta información se ha podido recabar hasta la fecha.
The testimony provides all the information that has been gathered to date. (formal)
Quien, donde, cuando as conditional-flavoured connectors
A subtle but important use: these free relatives can replace si in a conditional reading. They keep the relative structure but the meaning shades into "in the event that".
Quien no esté de acuerdo, que lo diga ahora.
Anyone who doesn't agree, say so now. (= si alguien no está de acuerdo)
Donde haya un problema, hay una solución.
Wherever there's a problem, there's a solution.
Cuando se tiene paciencia, todo llega.
When one is patient, everything comes.
The subjunctive in these patterns reflects their conditional flavour. Native speakers feel them as halfway between a free relative and an if-clause.
Free relatives after prepositions
All four main free relatives accept prepositions:
Hablaré con quien me indiquen.
I'll speak with whoever they tell me to.
Pienso en lo que me dijiste anoche.
I'm thinking about what you said to me last night.
Vamos a donde tú quieras esta noche.
Let's go wherever you want tonight.
No me acuerdo de cuando nos vimos por primera vez.
I don't remember when we first met.
A note on a donde / adonde: both spellings are accepted by the RAE, though the single-word adonde is preferred for goal of movement (adonde vayas, iré contigo). For non-movement contexts, donde alone suffices.
How free relatives differ from English "whoever / whatever"
The English -ever suffix bundles two ideas: (1) the relative function and (2) an emphatic "no matter who/what". Spanish keeps these separate. Plain quien / lo que / donde covers both readings, with the subjunctive doing the emphatic work when needed.
For the explicitly emphatic "no matter who / no matter what / no matter where", Spanish uses doubled subjunctive constructions: sea quien sea, sea lo que sea, vaya donde vaya. These are covered on the Subjuntivo duplicado page.
Sea quien sea el ganador, le felicitaremos.
Whoever the winner is, we'll congratulate them.
Sea lo que sea, lo arreglaremos juntos.
Whatever it is, we'll fix it together.
Vayas donde vayas, te seguiré.
Wherever you go, I'll follow you.
The plain free relative quien, lo que, donde is neutral. The doubled subjunctive adds the no matter force. Confusing the two — translating English whoever always as the doubled form — produces stilted Spanish.
Free relatives in proverbs and sayings
Spanish proverbs love free relatives — they pack a generalisation into the shortest possible syntactic frame.
Quien mucho abarca, poco aprieta.
Whoever takes on too much accomplishes little.
Quien siembra vientos, recoge tempestades.
Whoever sows wind reaps storms.
Donde fueres, haz lo que vieres.
Wherever you go, do as you see done. (uses archaic future subjunctive)
Cuando el río suena, agua lleva.
When the river sounds, it's carrying water. (= where there's smoke, there's fire)
The proverb register is the one place where quien + present subjunctive without a clear antecedent feels completely natural even in modern speech. Outside proverbs, contemporary speakers often prefer el que in casual contexts.
Common Mistakes
❌ Quien que vino ayer dejó el paquete en la mesa.
Incorrect — quien does not take a redundant que; it is already the relative pronoun.
✅ Quien vino ayer dejó el paquete en la mesa.
The person who came yesterday left the package on the table.
❌ Haré lo que tú quieres.
Mood error — open promise needs subjunctive; quieres implies a specific known wish, not a blanket offer.
✅ Haré lo que tú quieras.
I'll do whatever you want.
❌ Iré dónde tú me digas.
Spelling error — donde as a free relative has no accent; the accented dónde is interrogative.
✅ Iré donde tú me digas.
I'll go wherever you tell me to go.
❌ Quien sea quiera el premio, que levante la mano.
Awkward overlap — the doubled subjunctive sea quien sea is its own fixed construction; here a plain free relative is needed.
✅ Quien quiera el premio, que levante la mano.
Whoever wants the prize, raise your hand.
❌ Cuando llegarás, llámame.
Mood error — cuando referring to a future event takes the subjunctive, not the future indicative, after main-clause imperatives or futures.
✅ Cuando llegues, llámame.
When you arrive, call me.
Key Takeaways
- Spanish free relatives — quien, lo que, donde, cuando — combine the antecedent and the relative pronoun into a single word. There is no separate head noun.
- Mood follows referent identifiability: indicative for known, identified referents; subjunctive for open, hypothetical, or unspecified ones.
- Quien
- present subjunctive is the proverb construction. In modern conversational Spanish, el que is the everyday equivalent.
- For emphatic "no matter who / what / where", switch from the plain free relative to the doubled subjunctive (sea quien sea, vaya donde vaya).
- Accent matters: que / qué, quien / quién, donde / dónde, cuando / cuándo — the unaccented forms are the relatives, the accented forms the interrogatives.
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- Pronombre relativo 'quien/quienes'B1 — Quien is the human-only relative pronoun. It is restricted to people, mostly appears after prepositions or in non-restrictive clauses, and gives the sentence a slightly more elevated register than the all-purpose que.
- Pronombre relativo 'lo que'B1 — The neuter relative lo que — how to use it to mean 'what' or 'that which' when the antecedent is a whole idea, action, or situation rather than a specific noun, and how it differs from interrogative qué.
- Pronombre relativo 'donde'A2 — The relative donde for places — el sitio donde vivo — when it replaces en el que / en la que, when motion-prepositions a, de, hasta, por, hacia attach in front of it, and its non-place metaphorical uses.
- Subjuntivo en relativas avanzadasC1 — Advanced subjunctive in relative clauses — negative antecedents, superlative antecedents, free relatives, el-que hypotheticals, and the polarity switch under embedded negation.
- Subjuntivo en cláusulas relativasB2 — Spanish relative clauses pick indicative when the antecedent is real and known, and subjunctive when it's hypothetical, sought, or denied — a contrast that carries genuine semantic weight.