What is an infinitive?

This is a word that you will hear at lot in Spanish (and in languages in general!). The infinitive is basically the basic form of the verb- ie the verb before it is conjugated. In Spanish there are 3 main types of infinitives which end in either AR, ER or IR. In English the infinitive is translated as ‘to + verb’ so ‘to have’ (tener), ‘to go’ (ir), ‘to buy’ (comprar). These verbs can be used in the infinitive but it doesn’t indicate a person or a tense so in order to say ‘I have’ or ‘we buy’ you must conjugate the verb by finding the stem and then adding the right ending.