Spanish future tense: the two forms and when to use each

The simple future: one set of endings

This is the easiest conjugation in Spanish. The endings don’t attach to a stem, they attach to the complete infinitive, and they’re the same for -ar, -er and -ir verbs.

El año que viene compraremos una casa. El médico nos dirá los resultados el viernes.

Twelve verbs shorten the infinitive before adding those endings. The endings never change — only the stem does. Hacer is one of them — haré, not haceré — and the full hacer conjugation shows the same shortened stem turning up again in the conditional.

Ir a + infinitive: the everyday future

Conjugate ir in the present, add a, add the infinitive. Voy a, vas a, va a, vamos a, vais a, van a. The present of ir is irregular from the first form, so keep the ir conjugation close until voy, vas, va comes out without thinking.

Voy a llamar al banco esta tarde. Vamos a mudarnos en marzo. Mi hija va a estudiar enfermería.

This is what people actually say for plans, decisions already made, and anything close in time. It maps almost perfectly onto English “going to”, which for once makes an American’s instinct correct.

Spanish also uses the plain present for scheduled events, exactly like English: Mañana trabajo desde casa, El lunes tengo cita con el médico.

The future of probability

Here the simple future stops being about the future. Spanish uses it to guess about the present.

¿Dónde estará mi marido? — Where can my husband be? Estará en el gimnasio — He’s probably at the gym. Serán las tres — It must be about three. Tendrá unos cincuenta años — He must be around fifty.

The English equivalent is “must be” or “probably”, never “will”. This is common in speech and missing from most classroom lists, so it gets learned the hard way, mid-conversation.

Reference chart

When each one sounds natural

Both futures are correct in most sentences, so the question is which one a native speaker would pick.

Voy a comprar el boleto esta noche and Compraré el boleto esta noche both work. The first is a plan you already have; the second is a commitment made as you speak, or written Spanish.

For everyday speech, ir a carries most of the load. The simple future dominates in three places: predictions (lloverá), formal or written announcements (el banco cerrará a las dos), and probability (estará en casa).

Two structures refuse the future outright. In a future time clause with cuando or another time word pointing forward, Spanish uses the subjunctive: Cuando me jubile, viajaremos. For habits and questions, cuando takes the indicative as normal: Cuando llego a casa, ceno. And in a real future condition with si meaning “if”, Spanish uses the present: Si tengo tiempo, te llamo. The forms you need for that are on the present subjunctive page.