Mirar is the Spanish verb of intentional looking — directing your gaze at something deliberately. It contrasts sharply with ver (to see), which describes passive perception. You miras a painting because you've chosen to study it; you ves a painting because it happens to be in your field of vision. Spaniards keep the two verbs strictly separate, and using the wrong one is one of the most audible English-speaker mistakes.
Morphologically, mirar is the easiest verb in this entire reference: fully regular -ar in every tense, no spelling changes, no irregularities. The single subtlety is syntactic, not morphological — mirar takes a direct object with no preposition when the object is a thing (mira el cuadro — look at the painting), but takes the a of personal a before a person (mira a tu hermana — look at your sister). English speakers often insert a before things by analogy with look at — producing the wrong mirar a la tele.
Non-finite forms
| Form | Spanish | English |
|---|---|---|
| Infinitivo | mirar | to look at, to watch |
| Infinitivo compuesto | haber mirado | to have looked at |
| Gerundio | mirando | looking at |
| Gerundio compuesto | habiendo mirado | having looked at |
| Participio | mirado | looked at |
All regular. Mirando shows up constantly in progressive constructions: estaba mirando la luna (I was looking at the moon).
Indicative — simple tenses
Presente
| yo | tú | él/ella/usted | nosotros | vosotros | ellos/ellas/ustedes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| miro | miras | mira | miramos | miráis | miran |
Perfectly regular. Miráis takes the standard accent.
¿Por qué me miras así? ¿Tengo algo en la cara?
Why are you looking at me like that? Have I got something on my face?
Mi abuelo mira el telediario cada día a las tres en punto.
My grandfather watches the news every day at three on the dot.
Os miráis sin decir nada — ¿pasa algo entre vosotros?
You guys are looking at each other without saying anything — is something going on?
Pretérito perfecto simple
| yo | tú | él | nosotros | vosotros | ellos |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| miré | miraste | miró | miramos | mirasteis | miraron |
Regular. The yo form miré and third-person miró take the standard -ar preterite accents.
Cuando entré en el bar, todos me miraron como si fuera un extraterrestre.
When I walked into the bar, everyone looked at me like I was an alien.
Pretérito imperfecto
| yo | tú | él | nosotros | vosotros | ellos |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| miraba | mirabas | miraba | mirábamos | mirabais | miraban |
Common for habitual past looking and for describing a scene in progress.
De niña, miraba las estrellas durante horas desde la ventana de mi cuarto.
As a kid, I used to gaze at the stars for hours from my bedroom window.
Futuro simple
| yo | tú | él | nosotros | vosotros | ellos |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| miraré | mirarás | mirará | miraremos | miraréis | mirarán |
Esta tarde miraré los precios y te aviso si encuentro algo barato.
This afternoon I'll check the prices and let you know if I find anything cheap.
Condicional
| yo | tú | él | nosotros | vosotros | ellos |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| miraría | mirarías | miraría | miraríamos | miraríais | mirarían |
Yo en tu lugar miraría dos veces antes de firmar ese contrato.
If I were you, I'd look twice before signing that contract.
Indicative — compound tenses
Pretérito perfecto compuesto
| yo | tú | él | nosotros | vosotros | ellos |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| he mirado | has mirado | ha mirado | hemos mirado | habéis mirado | han mirado |
¿Has mirado el correo? Te he mandado el documento hace una hora.
Have you checked your email? I sent you the document an hour ago.
Pretérito pluscuamperfecto
| yo | tú | él | nosotros | vosotros | ellos |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| había mirado | habías mirado | había mirado | habíamos mirado | habíais mirado | habían mirado |
Antes de salir de casa, había mirado la previsión y no decía nada de lluvia.
Before leaving the house, I'd checked the forecast and it said nothing about rain.
Futuro compuesto
| yo | tú | él | nosotros | vosotros | ellos |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| habré mirado | habrás mirado | habrá mirado | habremos mirado | habréis mirado | habrán mirado |
Condicional compuesto
| yo | tú | él | nosotros | vosotros | ellos |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| habría mirado | habrías mirado | habría mirado | habríamos mirado | habríais mirado | habrían mirado |
Si hubiera mirado el mapa antes, no nos habríamos perdido en la sierra.
If I'd looked at the map first, we wouldn't have got lost in the mountains.
Subjunctive — simple tenses
Presente de subjuntivo
| yo | tú | él | nosotros | vosotros | ellos |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| mire | mires | mire | miremos | miréis | miren |
Standard -ar subjunctive endings. Miréis takes the accent.
Quiero que mires bien los precios antes de comprar nada.
I want you to check the prices carefully before buying anything.
No me importa que me miren raro, voy a hacer lo que me dé la gana.
I don't care if they look at me funny, I'm going to do whatever I want.
Imperfecto de subjuntivo (-ra / -se)
| yo | tú | él | nosotros | vosotros | ellos | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| -ra | mirara | miraras | mirara | miráramos | mirarais | miraran |
| -se | mirase | mirases | mirase | mirásemos | miraseis | mirasen |
Both forms valid; -ra dominates in Spain.
Le pedí que me mirara a los ojos antes de mentirme otra vez.
I asked him to look me in the eye before lying to me again.
Subjunctive — compound tenses
Pretérito perfecto de subjuntivo
| yo | tú | él | nosotros | vosotros | ellos |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| haya mirado | hayas mirado | haya mirado | hayamos mirado | hayáis mirado | hayan mirado |
Es raro que no hayas mirado el grupo de WhatsApp en todo el día.
It's odd that you haven't checked the WhatsApp group all day.
Pluscuamperfecto de subjuntivo
| yo | tú | él | nosotros | vosotros | ellos | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| -ra | hubiera mirado | hubieras mirado | hubiera mirado | hubiéramos mirado | hubierais mirado | hubieran mirado |
| -se | hubiese mirado | hubieses mirado | hubiese mirado | hubiésemos mirado | hubieseis mirado | hubiesen mirado |
Ojalá hubiera mirado mejor las fechas antes de comprar los billetes.
I wish I'd checked the dates more carefully before buying the tickets.
Imperative
| Form | Affirmative | Negative |
|---|---|---|
| tú | mira | no mires |
| usted | mire | no mire |
| nosotros | miremos | no miremos |
| vosotros | mirad | no miréis |
| ustedes | miren | no miren |
The imperative of mirar is one of the most-uttered words in spoken Spanish. ¡Mira! (look!) is everywhere — used to direct attention, to interrupt, to express surprise, and as a discourse marker meaning roughly look, the thing is.... Mirad keeps its final -d in the peninsular standard, though casual speech sometimes drops it.
¡Mira qué nubes tan raras! Va a caer una buena.
Look at those weird clouds! There's a big storm coming.
Mirad chicos, lo que necesitamos es organizarnos mejor.
Look kids, what we need is to organize ourselves better.
No me mires así, que no he hecho nada malo.
Don't look at me like that, I haven't done anything wrong.
Why mirar takes no preposition before things
English uses the construction look + at, where at is a separate preposition. Spanish bundles the at directly into the verb mirar. So I'm looking at the screen is just miro la pantalla, with the screen as a plain direct object — no preposition required.
This is the same logic as several other Spanish verbs that include their English preposition inside the verb:
| Spanish verb (already includes preposition) | English literal |
|---|---|
| mirar (algo) | to look at (something) |
| escuchar (algo) | to listen to (something) |
| buscar (algo) | to look for (something) |
| esperar (algo) | to wait for (something) |
| pedir (algo) | to ask for (something) |
All five of these verbs trip up English speakers because the obvious English preposition feels missing. You don't say escucho a la música (which would mean I listen to the music with the wrong structure); you say escucho la música. Same with mirar: miro la película, not miro a la película.
The one situation where mirar does take a is when the object is a person — and that's not a preposition specific to mirar; it's the universal personal a of Spanish, which marks any human direct object after any verb.
Mira a tu hermana, está aprendiendo a montar en bici.
Look at your sister, she's learning to ride a bike.
No mires al profesor cuando hables, mira a la cámara.
Don't look at the teacher when you speak, look at the camera.
In the second example, mira al profesor (a + el → al) keeps the personal a because the teacher is a person, but mira a la cámara uses a because cámara is being treated as a directional target — to / toward the camera, more like mirar hacia. With pure objects of gaze, the a drops out entirely.
Mirar vs ver — the intentional vs perception distinction
This is the contrast that learners must internalize:
- mirar = to direct one's gaze (intentional, active)
- ver = to perceive with one's eyes (passive, capacity)
The same scene can be described with either verb depending on which aspect you're foregrounding.
Vi un pájaro raro en el parque y me paré a mirarlo.
I saw a strange bird in the park and stopped to look at it.
The first verb (vi) is passive perception — the bird crossed the speaker's field of vision. The second (mirarlo) is intentional gaze — the speaker chose to stop and study it.
Television is a famous edge case. Both mirar la tele and ver la tele are used in Spain, with a subtle difference: ver la tele foregrounds the act of watching as entertainment consumption (esta noche voy a ver la tele), while mirar la tele foregrounds the gaze (estaba mirando la tele cuando sonó el timbre). In casual speech they overlap heavily, and many speakers use them interchangeably. Ver la tele is somewhat more frequent overall.
For films and series, the standard verb is ver: ver una película, ver una serie. Mirar una película sounds slightly off — as if you were staring at it without really watching the content.
High-frequency expressions with mirar
| Phrase | Meaning |
|---|---|
| ¡Mira! | Look! (also: hey, get this) |
| mira a ver | have a look, check it out |
| mirar de reojo | to look out of the corner of one's eye |
| mirar por encima del hombro | to look down on someone |
| mirar para otro lado | to look the other way (to ignore deliberately) |
| mirar(se) al espejo | to look (at oneself) in the mirror |
| mira tú por dónde | well, what do you know (Spain — expressing surprise) |
| de mírame y no me toques | extremely fragile (Spain — idiom) |
| mirar las musarañas | to stare into space, to daydream |
Mira a ver si... is a peninsular favorite for asking someone to check on something: mira a ver si he dejado las llaves en el coche (go check whether I left the keys in the car). Mira tú por dónde is a slightly old-fashioned but still common expression of surprise, roughly well, look at that.
Mira a ver si el pan está ya, lo metí en el horno hace media hora.
Have a look and see if the bread is ready, I put it in the oven half an hour ago.
Y mira tú por dónde, al final el plan salió perfecto.
And what do you know, in the end the plan worked out perfectly.
The classic English-speaker error
The signature error is inserting a before things, by analogy with English look at. Miro a la tele, miro a la pantalla, miro a la luna are all wrong — Spanish does not need a before a non-human direct object. The correct forms are miro la tele, miro la pantalla, miro la luna.
A second error is using mirar where Spanish requires ver. Saying ¿has mirado la nueva película? when you mean have you seen the new film? is wrong: for films and series, the verb is ver. ¿Has visto la nueva película? The reverse error also happens — using ver for a deliberate look (ve a tu hermana instead of mira a tu hermana) — but it's less common.
A third trap is confusing mirar with parecer in the meaning to look (a certain way). English you look tired maps to Spanish pareces cansado, not miras cansado. Mirar in Spanish is always about gaze; descriptions of appearance use parecer.
Common Mistakes
❌ Miro a la tele cada noche antes de cenar.
Mirar takes a direct object with no preposition when the object is a thing: la tele, not a la tele.
✅ Miro la tele cada noche antes de cenar.
I watch TV every evening before dinner.
❌ ¿Has mirado la nueva temporada de la serie?
For films and series, Spaniards use ver, not mirar.
✅ ¿Has visto la nueva temporada de la serie?
Have you seen the new season of the series?
❌ Miras muy cansado hoy, ¿has dormido bien?
To say someone looks (appears) a certain way, Spanish uses parecer, not mirar. Mirar is only the act of gazing.
✅ Pareces muy cansado hoy, ¿has dormido bien?
You look very tired today, did you sleep well?
❌ Mira a la pantalla y dime qué ves.
Pantalla is a thing, not a person, so no a before it after mirar.
✅ Mira la pantalla y dime qué ves.
Look at the screen and tell me what you see.
❌ Escucho a la música mientras corro.
Like mirar, escuchar already contains its English preposition (to), so no a before the thing.
✅ Escucho la música mientras corro.
I listen to music while I run.
Key Takeaways
- Mirar is fully regular in every tense — no spelling changes, no irregularities.
- The at of English look at is already inside the Spanish verb; no preposition before a thing: mira la luna, not mira a la luna.
- Mirar takes the personal a only when the object is a person: mira a tu hermana.
- Mirar (intentional gaze) and ver (passive perception) are strictly distinct. For films and series, always ver: ver una película.
- For physical TV-watching as an activity, both ver la tele and mirar la tele work in Spain, with ver slightly more common.
- The imperative ¡mira! is one of the most-uttered words in spoken Spanish, used to direct attention, signal surprise, or open a sentence as a discourse marker.
- Don't confuse mirar (to gaze) with parecer (to appear / look a certain way): pareces cansado, not miras cansado.
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Start learning Spanish→Related Topics
- Presente de indicativo: verbos regulares en -arA1 — The six present-indicative endings for regular -ar verbs in peninsular Spanish, including the all-important vosotros form habláis.
- Imperativo afirmativo de vosotros: ¡hablad!A2 — The peninsular affirmative vosotros command — replace the -r of the infinitive with -d, drop the -d before reflexives, and never substitute the infinitive.
- El 'a' personal con pronombresA2 — Spanish marks human direct objects with the preposition 'a' — 'Veo a María' not 'Veo María'. It's obligatory with people, common with pets, and sometimes extends to personified things.
- verA1 — Full conjugation reference for ver (to see, to watch) — a short verb with a surprising amount of irregularity. Includes the present (veo, ves, ve, vemos, veis, ven), the unaccented preterite (vi, viste, vio), the preserved-vowel imperfect (veía), the irregular past participle (visto), and the key sense distinctions between ver, mirar, and parecer.