A Spanish imperative is not the only way to tell someone what to do — and in many real-world contexts it is not even the most natural choice. Signs, recipes, gym instructors, parents, public-information leaflets and everyday peninsular speech all reach for non-imperative constructions instead: the bare infinitive (No fumar), the present indicative (Primero pelas la patata), hay que + infinitive (Hay que estudiar), and — strictly in informal Spain — the very widespread colloquial bare infinitive as a familiar order (¡Callar! ¡Sentaros!). Knowing these is what separates a learner who can produce imperatives from one who sounds like a Spaniard.
Why these alternatives exist
The imperative is grammatically tied to a specific addressee: it always knows whether you mean tú, vosotros, usted or ustedes. That precision is useful when you are face to face, but in three situations it gets in the way:
- Generic, no addressee — a sign on a fence, a recipe in a magazine, instructions inside a microwave. You are not telling a particular person to do anything; you are stating what the addressee — whoever they turn out to be — should do.
- Stepwise procedures — a recipe or a how-to, where the natural tone is here's how this works, not I order you to.
- Universal obligation — advice that applies to everybody, including the speaker.
Each of these has its own go-to construction in peninsular Spanish.
1. Bare infinitive: signs, instructions, recipes
The infinitive on its own — with no subject, no auxiliary, no preposition — is the standard form for impersonal written commands. You see it everywhere in Spain on public signage, packaging, and instruction manuals.
No fumar en las instalaciones.
No smoking on the premises.
Empujar.
Push. (sign on a door)
Agitar bien antes de usar.
Shake well before use. (on a bottle)
No pisar el césped.
Keep off the grass.
The infinitive here is not "informal" or "lazy" — it is the register-correct form for impersonal written prohibition and instruction. Using a tú or vosotros imperative on a public sign (¡no fumes!) would sound oddly intimate; using usted (no fume) is possible but feels stiff and dated. The infinitive sidesteps the choice altogether by addressing no one in particular.
The same logic extends to recipes and instruction manuals, where each step can be opened with an infinitive: Pelar las patatas. Cortarlas en rodajas. Freírlas a fuego medio. This is the standard "cookbook voice" in Spanish writing, equivalent to English Peel the potatoes. Slice them. Fry them over medium heat.
Pelar y cortar dos cebollas. Rehogarlas en aceite caliente.
Peel and chop two onions. Sauté them in hot oil.
2. Present indicative as instruction: the recipe and how-to voice
Alongside the infinitive recipe style, Spanish has a second — arguably more common in spoken instructions — option: the present indicative in the tú form, delivered as if you were narrating what the listener is about to do. This is the natural voice when a Spanish person is explaining how to do something rather than commanding it.
Primero pelas la patata, luego la cortas en rodajas y la fríes.
First you peel the potato, then you slice it and fry it.
Vas todo recto y al llegar al semáforo te giras a la derecha.
You go straight ahead and when you reach the lights you turn right.
Coges el metro, te bajas en Sol y desde ahí ya andas.
You take the metro, get off at Sol and from there you walk.
Notice how naturally the listener accepts this as a directive — exactly as English does with you peel the potato, then you slice it. The grammatical form is indicative ("you peel"), but the pragmatic force is instruction. Spanish speakers reach for this voice whenever they are giving directions, explaining a procedure, or describing a routine that the listener should follow. The imperative (pela, corta, fríe) is also possible here, but feels noticeably more clipped — more "drill sergeant" than "friendly guide".
The same construction works for the vosotros address when you are talking to a group:
Vosotros cogéis el coche, dejáis las cosas en el hotel y nos vemos en la plaza.
You guys take the car, drop your stuff at the hotel, and we'll meet at the plaza.
3. Hay que + infinitive: universal obligation
When the obligation applies to everyone in general, including possibly the speaker, Spanish uses hay que + infinitive. It is the impersonal equivalent of one must / you have to — there is no grammatical subject and no specific addressee.
Hay que estudiar todos los días si quieres aprobar.
You have to study every day if you want to pass.
Hay que ir a la farmacia antes de que cierren.
Someone needs to go to the pharmacy before they close.
Hay que tener paciencia con los niños pequeños.
One must be patient with small children.
The contrast with a true imperative is sharp. ¡Estudia todos los días! is a direct order to you. Hay que estudiar todos los días is a general life-truth — it presents the obligation as a fact about the world, not as a command issued from me to you. This is why hay que is the natural form for proverbs, parental advice, public-health messaging, and any "this is just how things are" statement.
A close cousin is hace falta + infinitive, which is slightly softer and emphasises necessity rather than obligation: Hace falta comer más despacio (You/we need to eat more slowly). And for a personal version — when the obligation falls specifically on you — Spanish reaches for tienes que / tenéis que / tiene que + infinitive: Tienes que estudiar más (You have to study more). The cline runs from impersonal (hay que) → personal indirect (tienes que) → direct command (¡estudia!), and skilled speakers pick their rung with care.
4. Colloquial peninsular bare infinitive as familiar command
Here is the construction every learner in Spain hears within their first week and no textbook quite prepares them for. Spaniards routinely use the bare infinitive as a casual second-person command in informal speech:
¡Callar, que no me dejáis oír la tele!
Quiet, you guys! I can't hear the TV!
¡Sentaros aquí que hay sitio!
Sit down here, there's room!
¡Venir todos, que voy a hacer una foto!
Everyone come here, I'm going to take a photo!
Prescriptively, none of these are "correct". The Real Academia condemns them. The proper forms are ¡callad!, ¡sentaos!, ¡venid! — the affirmative vosotros imperative. But in everyday peninsular speech, especially among friends, family, parents to children and even in casual workplace banter, the infinitive routinely replaces the vosotros imperative. ¡Sentaros! is overwhelmingly more common in the street than ¡sentaos!
This is not a regional quirk — it is heard from Galicia to Andalusia, from Barcelona to Las Palmas. The historical pressure is straightforward: -aos, -eos, -íos are awkward to pronounce and feel old-fashioned, while the infinitive is a single, easy syllable cluster.
A special case worth flagging: iros is the colloquial replacement of idos (the affirmative vosotros imperative of irse). ¡Iros ya! (Get going!) is what 95% of Spaniards actually say. The prescriptive form ¡idos! is now so rare that even careful speakers find it stilted. In 2017 the RAE finally accepted iros as a legitimate variant — the colloquial form had simply won.
¡Iros a la cama ya, que mañana hay cole!
Off to bed with you, there's school tomorrow!
Choosing among the options: a quick guide
| Context | Best choice | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Sign, label, manual | Bare infinitive | No pisar el césped. |
| Recipe (written) | Bare infinitive or 2nd-sg present | Pelar las patatas / Pelas las patatas. |
| Giving directions out loud | 2nd-sg present indicative | Vas recto y giras a la derecha. |
| General life advice | Hay que
| Hay que dormir ocho horas. |
| Specific personal obligation | Tienes / tenéis que
| Tenéis que llegar antes de las ocho. |
| Direct face-to-face command | Imperative | ¡Ven!, ¡Venid! |
| Casual command to friends/kids (Spain) | Colloquial bare infinitive | ¡Sentaros! (informal only) |
How this differs from English
English uses the same form — the bare verb (go!, sit!) — for nearly all of these functions, distinguishing them only by tone, context and punctuation. Spanish forces you to choose a grammatical construction that already encodes the register and the relationship: an infinitive on a sign, an indicative for a guided procedure, hay que for a universal truth, an imperative for a face-to-face command. The construction itself carries social information. This is why a Spanish recipe written entirely in imperatives (¡pela!, ¡corta!, ¡fríe!) reads as oddly aggressive to a native ear, even though every form is grammatical.
Common Mistakes
❌ ¡No fumes en las instalaciones! (on a public sign)
Incorrect — the tú imperative is too personal for impersonal signage.
✅ No fumar en las instalaciones.
No smoking on the premises.
❌ Tienes que estudiar todos los días si quieres aprobar. (as general advice to anyone)
Wrong nuance — sounds like you're scolding the listener specifically.
✅ Hay que estudiar todos los días si quieres aprobar.
One must study every day to pass — impersonal advice.
❌ Primero pele la patata, luego córtela. (to a friend, casually)
Incorrect register — usted imperatives sound formal/distant with a friend.
✅ Primero pelas la patata, luego la cortas.
First you peel the potato, then you slice it.
❌ ¡Sientense aquí! (talking to a group of friends in Spain)
Incorrect — ustedes form is not used for friends in Spain.
✅ ¡Sentaos aquí! (or colloquially ¡Sentaros aquí!)
Sit down here!
❌ Hay que vas a la farmacia.
Incorrect — hay que is always followed by an infinitive, never a conjugated verb.
✅ Hay que ir a la farmacia.
Someone needs to go to the pharmacy.
Key takeaways
- The imperative is one option among many. In Spain, signs prefer the infinitive, recipes alternate infinitive and tú-present, and general advice uses hay que.
- Hay que
- infinitive is impersonal: "one must". Tienes que
- infinitive is personal: "you must".
- infinitive is impersonal: "one must". Tienes que
- The colloquial bare infinitive (¡callar!, ¡sentaros!) is everywhere in spoken peninsular Spanish despite being prescriptively wrong. Recognise it, but produce the standard vosotros form yourself until you are fully comfortable with the register.
- Iros has officially won over idos — even the RAE has bowed.
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Start learning Spanish→Related Topics
- Imperativo: visión generalA2 — The master map of the Spanish imperative — affirmative and negative commands for tú, vosotros, usted, ustedes and nosotros — with the peninsular vosotros form as its headline feature.
- 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.
- Imperativo: guía completaB1 — A single reference page with the full peninsular imperative paradigm — every person, affirmative and negative, pronoun attachment, accent placement, and twenty model verbs.
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- El infinitivo: visión generalA2 — The Spanish infinitive in one place — its three forms (simple, compound, reflexive), its three endings (-ar / -er / -ir), and the full menu of jobs it does in a sentence.