Breakdown of Tendrás que limpiar la jaula en cuanto llegues.
tener
to have
llegar
to arrive
que
that / than
limpiar
to clean
la
the (feminine)
en cuanto
as soon as
la jaula
cage
Questions & Answers about Tendrás que limpiar la jaula en cuanto llegues.
Why do we use the subjunctive llegues here instead of the normal present tense llegas?
Because of the phrase en cuanto (as soon as) combined with a future action. Whenever you use time expressions like en cuanto, cuando, or hasta que to talk about something that hasn't happened yet, Spanish requires the present subjunctive. If this were a regular habit, you would use the normal indicative llegas.
What does en cuanto mean?
En cuanto translates to 'as soon as'. It is a temporal phrase linking two events. You might also hear tan pronto como, which means the exact same thing and follows the exact same subjunctive rules for future events.
Why is there a que between tendrás and limpiar?
The phrase for 'to have to do something' is always tener que followed by an infinitive verb. Here, tener is conjugated in the future tense (tendrás), but you still must keep the que before the action verb limpiar.
Can I switch the order of the sentence and start with en cuanto?
Yes, you can say En cuanto llegues, tendrás que limpiar la jaula. The meaning is identical. The verb llegar still takes the subjunctive form llegues because it still refers to an anticipated future event.
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