Si el plan sale mal, queremos seguir estudiando español.

If the plan goes wrong, we want to keep studying Spanish.

Breakdown of Si el plan sale mal, queremos seguir estudiando español.

• querer: to want
• nosotros: we
• estudiar: to study
• español: Spanish
• .: period
• si: if
• ,: comma
• seguir: to continue
• el plan: the plan
• salir mal: to go badly

Questions & Answers about Si el plan sale mal, queremos seguir estudiando español.

What does sale mal literally mean here, and why use salir?

Salir mal is an idiomatic expression meaning “to turn out badly / to go wrong.”

Literally, salir = to go out / to come out, and mal = badly.
Together: el plan sale mal ≈ the plan turns out badly, the plan goes wrong.

Some common patterns:

• salir bien – to turn out well
  
  • La entrevista salió bien. – “The interview went well.”
• salir mal – to turn out badly
  
  • El experimento salió mal. – “The experiment turned out badly.”

So Si el plan sale mal is the natural Spanish way to say “If the plan goes wrong / doesn’t work out.”

Why is it sale (present indicative) and not salga (subjunctive) after si?

In Spanish, the usual structure for real, possible conditions is:

• Si + present indicative, + present / future / imperative.

Examples:

• Si llueve, nos quedamos en casa. – If it rains, we stay at home.
• Si llueve, nos quedaremos en casa. – If it rains, we’ll stay at home.

Your sentence follows this pattern:

• Si el plan sale mal, queremos seguir estudiando español.

This expresses a real or reasonably possible situation: If the plan goes wrong, we (already now) want to keep studying Spanish.

The subjunctive salga appears in a different type of conditional:

• Si el plan saliera mal, querríamos seguir estudiando español.

That would sound more hypothetical/unlikely: If the plan were to go wrong, we would want to keep studying Spanish.

Can you say Si el plan saldrá mal?

No, that’s not standard Spanish. After si (meaning if), Spanish normally does not use the future tense.

You say:

• Si el plan sale mal, … ✅ (present indicative)
• Si vienes mañana, … ✅
• Si tengo tiempo, te llamo. ✅

But not:

• ✗ Si el plan saldrá mal, …
• ✗ Si vendrás mañana, …
• ✗ Si tendré tiempo, …

The future tense can appear in the main clause, not in the si-clause:

• Si el plan sale mal, seguiremos estudiando español. – If the plan goes wrong, we will keep studying Spanish.

Could you say Si el plan va mal instead of sale mal? What’s the difference?

Yes, Si el plan va mal is grammatically correct, but the nuance changes slightly.

• Si el plan sale mal
  Focus on the outcome/result:
  If the plan turns out badly / if it goes wrong in the end.

• Si el plan va mal
  Focus on how it is progressing:
  If the plan is going badly / if it’s not going well (as it happens).

They often overlap in meaning, but:

• If you’re thinking of the final result, sale mal is more natural.
• If you’re talking about the plan as it’s unfolding, va mal may sound more appropriate.

In everyday speech, salir mal for “go wrong” is extremely common and very natural.

Why do we use mal and not malo in sale mal?

Because here we need an adverb, not an adjective.

• mal = adverb = badly / poorly
• malo / mala = adjective = bad

With verbs like salir (turn out, go), you use mal / bien:

• El plan sale mal. – The plan turns out badly.
• El plan sale bien. – The plan turns out well.

You’d use malo to describe a noun:

• Es un plan malo. – It’s a bad plan.

So:

• sale mal ✅
• sale malo ❌ in this meaning

Why is it queremos and not a future like querremos or a conditional like querríamos?

Here, queremos is in the present tense, but it can express a present intention about the future, just like in English:

• Este verano queremos viajar a España. – This summer we want/plan to travel to Spain.

In your sentence:

• … queremos seguir estudiando español.

Means: “we want (we have the intention) to keep studying Spanish” if that situation happens.

Alternatives:

• querríamos seguir estudiando español – we would want to keep studying Spanish
  
  • sounds more hypothetical/polite.
• querremos seguir estudiando español – grammatically possible but
  
  • rare and a bit stiff; native speakers usually prefer present:
    Si el plan sale mal, seguiremos estudiando español
    or
    Si el plan sale mal, queremos seguir estudiando español.

What exactly does seguir estudiando mean?

Seguir + gerund means “to keep / to continue doing something.”

So:

• seguir estudiando = to keep studying / to continue studying.

Other examples:

• Sigue lloviendo. – It’s still raining / It keeps raining.
• Quiero seguir viviendo aquí. – I want to keep living here.
• Seguimos trabajando en el proyecto. – We are still working on the project / We keep working on the project.

In your sentence:

• queremos seguir estudiando español
  = we want to keep studying Spanish.

Why is it seguir estudiando and not seguir estudiar?

Because seguir (in this “continue/keep” sense) is followed by a gerund, not by an infinitive.

Patterns:

• seguir + gerundio
  
  • seguir estudiando – keep studying
  • seguir trabajando – keep working
  • seguir intentando – keep trying

Compare with querer, which does take the infinitive:

• querer + infinitivo
  
  • querer estudiar – to want to study
  • querer trabajar – to want to work

So:

• queremos seguir estudiando ✅
• queremos seguir estudiar ❌

Is estudiando here like English “are studying”? Is this a progressive tense?

Not exactly. Estudiando is a gerund, but the tense is given by queremos, not by estudiando.

• queremos seguir estudiando
  literally: we want to keep on studying.

Spanish progressive tenses use estar + gerund:

• Estamos estudiando español. – We are studying Spanish.

In your sentence, estudiando forms a verbal phrase with seguir:

• seguir estudiando – to keep studying.

So it’s not a separate progressive tense like “we are studying”; it’s part of the construction seguir + gerund meaning “keep doing.”

Could we say seguir con el español or seguir con el estudio del español instead?

You could, but the tone changes:

• seguir estudiando español
  Very natural, direct, and colloquial: keep studying Spanish.

• seguir con el español
  Possible, sounds more vague / informal:
  keep going with Spanish / carry on with Spanish.

• seguir con el estudio del español
  Grammatically correct but more formal/bookish:
  continue with the study of Spanish.

For everyday speech, seguir estudiando español is the most idiomatic and neutral.

Why don’t we say el español here? When do we use the article with language names?

Both are possible:

• seguir estudiando español
• seguir estudiando el español

General guidelines:

1. After verbs like hablar, estudiar, aprender, the article is often omitted, especially in modern usage:

   • Estudio inglés y francés.
   • Aprendemos alemán.

2. You can include the article to refer to the language more as a subject/field, or in more formal or emphatic contexts:

   • El español es una lengua muy importante.
   • Quiero estudiar más a fondo el español.

In your sentence, seguir estudiando español sounds more natural and common in everyday conversation in Spain.
seguir estudiando el español is correct but slightly more formal or emphatic.

Can we change the word order to Queremos seguir estudiando español si el plan sale mal?

Yes, that word order is perfectly correct:

• Si el plan sale mal, queremos seguir estudiando español.
• Queremos seguir estudiando español si el plan sale mal.

Both mean the same. The difference is slight emphasis:

• Starting with Si el plan sale mal puts more focus on the condition.
• Starting with Queremos puts more focus on what you want.

In everyday speech, both are natural; context and rhythm usually decide which one sounds better.

Is this sentence specifically “Spain Spanish”? Would it be different in Latin America?

The sentence:

• Si el plan sale mal, queremos seguir estudiando español.

is perfectly natural in both Spain and Latin America.

Small possible differences:

• In Spain, many people also say castellano for the language:
  • … seguir estudiando castellano.
• In Latin America, español is far more common; castellano is used in some regions but not everywhere.

Apart from that vocabulary choice, the grammar (si el plan sale mal, seguir estudiando) is standard across the Spanish-speaking world.