Guide: What have you done?

The key rules of this unit in two minutes. Tap the speaker to hear each example.

The perfect: haber + participle

Spanish builds the perfect with “haber”: he, has, ha, hemos, habéis, han, plus the participle. Just like English “have”, it is the only helper verb you need: he ido, I have gone.

He hablado con Lucía.I have spoken to Lucía.
Hemos comido paella.We have eaten paella.

-ado and -ido

Verbs ending in -ar make their participle with -ado (hablar → hablado), verbs ending in -er and -ir with -ido (comer → comido, vivir → vivido).

he trabajadoI have worked
he vividoI have lived

The irregular ones

A handful of everyday verbs have their own participles. Learn these by heart: hecho, visto, dicho, escrito, puesto, vuelto, abierto.

¿Qué has hecho?What have you done?
No he visto la película.I haven’t seen the film.

When to use it

In Spain the perfect is used for anything that happened today, this week or “ever”, often with ya, todavía no, nunca or alguna vez.

Ya he comido.I have already eaten.
Nunca he estado en México.I have never been to Mexico.

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