Spanish has three special contracted forms that fuse the preposition con ("with") with a pronoun: conmigo ("with me"), contigo ("with you", informal singular), and consigo ("with himself / herself / themselves / yourself-formal"). Everywhere else in the system the preposition stays separate from its pronoun — con nosotros, con vosotros, con ella, con ellos — but these three forms are obligatory contractions. You cannot say *con mí, *con ti, or *con sí. They are ungrammatical, full stop.
These contractions look like quirks, but they are extremely common in everyday speech because con is one of the most frequent prepositions in Spanish. Learners who skip this page tend to produce con mí for months before noticing — it is one of the most persistent, audible learner errors. This page covers what the three forms mean, when each is required, the reflexive logic behind consigo, and the boundary cases where they don't apply.
Where the contractions come from
The contracted endings (-migo, -tigo, -sigo) descend from Latin mecum, tecum, secum, where cum meant "with" and was attached as an enclitic to the pronoun (literally "me-with"). When Spanish speakers reanalyzed those forms in the early medieval period, they no longer recognized the embedded -cum as "with," so they added another con in front — leaving the historical "with" buried inside the word. Conmigo is etymologically "with-me-with," and Spanish speakers are unaware of this until it's pointed out.
This historical accident is why no other person has a contracted form: nosotros and vosotros are later inventions (from nos otros, vos otros) that never went through the Latin contraction stage, and the third-person pronouns él, ella, ellos, ellas descend from a different Latin demonstrative (ille) that never combined with cum the way the personal pronouns did.
The three forms in detail
| Form | Means | Replaces ungrammatical |
|---|---|---|
| conmigo | with me | *con mí |
| contigo | with you (informal singular) | *con ti |
| consigo | with himself / herself / themselves / yourself (formal, reflexive) | *con sí |
All other persons use con plus the standard prepositional pronoun: con él, con ella, con usted, con nosotros, con nosotras, con vosotros, con vosotras, con ellos, con ellas, con ustedes. None of these contract.
¿Vienes conmigo al cine esta noche?
Are you coming with me to the cinema tonight?
Me encanta estar contigo.
I love being with you.
Voy al supermercado, ¿quieres venir con nosotros?
I'm going to the supermarket, do you want to come with us?
Notice the asymmetry in that last example: conmigo contracts, but con nosotros does not.
Conmigo: "with me"
Conmigo is used whenever con would otherwise govern the first-person singular pronoun mí. It does not change for gender or grammatical role — it is a single invariable form. It works in any clause type: statements, questions, commands, and embedded clauses.
Conmigo no cuentes para eso.
Don't count on me for that.
No quiere hablar conmigo desde que discutimos.
She hasn't wanted to talk to me since we argued.
Llévalo contigo y devuélvemelo cuando puedas.
Take it with you and give it back to me when you can.
The Spanish conmigo also covers cases where English uses different phrasings — "alongside me," "in my company," "by my side," "on my team":
Tienes suerte de tenerlo a tu lado, pero yo prefiero que esté conmigo.
You're lucky to have him by your side, but I prefer him to be with me.
Contigo: "with you" (informal singular)
Contigo corresponds to tú. It is the form used with friends, family, peers — anyone you address with tú. Crucially, contigo is not used with usted: the formal singular takes the regular con usted.
¿Puedo hablar contigo un momento?
Can I talk with you for a moment?
Quiero ir contigo, no con ellos.
I want to go with you, not with them.
Buenos días, señor Pérez. ¿Puedo hablar con usted un momento?
Good morning, Mr. Pérez. May I speak with you for a moment?
That third example shows the contrast directly: contigo with a peer becomes con usted in a formal register. Confusing the two — contigo with a stranger you should be calling usted — sounds startlingly intimate.
Consigo: "with him/herself" — reflexive only
Consigo is the trickiest of the three because it is reflexive only. It means "with himself, herself, themselves, yourself (formal)" — that is, the con-phrase refers back to the subject of the same clause. If the con-phrase refers to a different person, you cannot use consigo; you must use con él, con ella, con ellos, con usted, etc.
Compare:
Lleva siempre el pasaporte consigo.
He always carries his passport with him (= with himself).
Lleva siempre el pasaporte con él.
She always carries the passport with him (= with someone else, a different person).
The first sentence is reflexive: the subject and the con-phrase are the same person. The second sentence is non-reflexive: the subject (she) carries the passport with a different person (él). Both are grammatical, but they mean different things — and only the reflexive case uses consigo.
This reflexive constraint is the same logic that governs the pronoun sí in general: sí refers back to the subject of the clause. Consigo is just con + sí fused together. Compare with the non-fused alternatives — de sí mismo, para sí mismo, contra sí mismo — all of which follow the same reflexive rule but don't contract.
Está enfadado consigo mismo por haberlo olvidado.
He's angry with himself for having forgotten it.
Trajo consigo todos los documentos necesarios.
She brought with her (= with herself) all the necessary documents.
Los ladrones se llevaron consigo todo lo que pudieron.
The thieves took with them (= with themselves) everything they could.
The intensifier mismo / misma / mismos / mismas is often added after consigo (and after sí more generally) to make the reflexive reading unambiguous, especially in writing. Consigo mismo and consigo misma are entirely standard.
When the subject is usted
A subtle but important case: when the formal subject is usted and the con-phrase refers back to usted, the reflexive form consigo is used — not con usted.
Señor, ¿lleva usted consigo algún documento de identidad?
Sir, are you carrying any ID with you?
This is the same logic. Usted is grammatically third-person, so its reflexive pronoun is se / sí, and the con-contraction is consigo. Beginners often produce con usted here because they are matching the subject pronoun directly — but reflexive use overrides that instinct.
When the contractions do NOT apply
The contractions are obligatory only when con governs mí, ti, or reflexive sí. They are not used:
1. After other prepositions. Only con triggers these forms. With other prepositions, the regular pronoun mí, ti, sí appears:
Este regalo es para mí, no para ti.
This gift is for me, not for you.
Habló de mí durante toda la cena.
He talked about me throughout dinner.
2. With entre and certain other prepositions in specific constructions. The preposition entre takes the subject pronouns yo and tú rather than mí and ti, so it never produces conmigo-type forms either:
Entre tú y yo, no me cae bien.
Between you and me, I don't like him.
3. When con is followed by another element first. If con is followed by an adjective, adverb, or quantifier before reaching the pronoun, no contraction occurs — though these constructions are rare:
Con solo tú a mi lado, soy feliz.
With just you by my side, I'm happy.
This is a poetic-leaning construction; in everyday speech you would simply say contigo a mi lado.
Common idiomatic uses
A handful of high-frequency idioms use these forms and are worth learning as fixed phrases:
¿Quieres venir conmigo?
Do you want to come with me?
No tengo dinero conmigo.
I don't have any money on me.
Cuento contigo.
I'm counting on you.
Cuento contigo para mañana.
I'm counting on you for tomorrow.
Está muy contento consigo mismo.
He's very pleased with himself.
Lleva siempre el teléfono consigo.
He always has his phone on him.
Note especially the idiom "to have X on one": in English we say have X on me; in Spanish it is tener X conmigo (or tener X encima — both common).
Common mistakes
❌ ¿Quieres venir con mí?
Incorrect — *con mí is ungrammatical. The contraction conmigo is obligatory.
✅ ¿Quieres venir conmigo?
Do you want to come with me?
❌ Voy a hablar con ti mañana.
Incorrect — *con ti is ungrammatical.
✅ Voy a hablar contigo mañana.
I'm going to talk with you tomorrow.
❌ Llevó el dinero con él mismo.
Awkward — when the meaning is reflexive (with himself), the contraction consigo is preferred.
✅ Llevó el dinero consigo.
He took the money with him (= with himself).
❌ Conmigos / contigos / consigos al concierto.
Incorrect — these forms have no plural. There is no *conmigos.
✅ ¿Venís con nosotros al concierto?
Are you (plural) coming with us to the concert?
❌ Trabaja consigo todos los días.
Incorrect if the meaning is 'with him' (a different person). Consigo is reflexive only.
✅ Trabaja con él todos los días.
He works with him every day.
The last error is the most insidious: learners learn that consigo means "with him" and start using it for any "with him" context. It only works when the "him" is the same person as the subject. If the subject and the con-phrase refer to different people, use con él.
Key takeaways
- Conmigo, contigo, consigo are obligatory contractions of con with mí, ti, and reflexive sí. Con mí, con ti, con sí are ungrammatical.
- Only these three persons contract. All other persons keep con separate: con él, con ella, con usted, con nosotros, con vosotros, con ellos, con ellas, con ustedes.
- Consigo is reflexive only: the con-phrase must refer back to the subject of the clause. For non-reflexive "with him/her," use con él / con ella.
- The forms are invariable: they don't change for gender or grammatical role.
- Other prepositions (para, de, sin, sobre, etc.) never trigger these contractions — only con.
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