If you need to describe the ‘time it takes’ to do something, then you’ll need the Spanish verb tardar.
You can also use this useful Spanish verb to talk about delays, or set deadlines using a common Spanish phrase.
Tardar also falls into the list of the top 1000 most useful Spanish words for conversational Spanish, listed in the conversation hacking guide. This means you will more than likely need this verb in your next Spanish conversation.
In this post, you’ll learn how to use the Spanish verb tardar for talking about the time it takes to do something, how to minimise delays, how to set deadlines, and you’ll also learn how to think about the grammar of this useful Spanish verb.
Tardar – An intransitive verb
Before we look at the uses of tardar, we need to talk about how it behaves.
Firstly, tardar is intransitive, this means we don’t need an object in a sentence with this verb.
To help understand this idea, you can compare tardar to the English verb ‘to wait’.
In English, as a response to a question like “what were you doing?”, you could say:
I was waiting.
In this sentence ‘waiting’ doesn’t have an object, there is just the subject ‘I’ and the verb. You could also say:
I was waiting at the bus station.
We were waiting in the car.
They were waiting for 4 hours.
In each of these sentences there isn’t an object, simply a further description of how or where the ‘waiting’ was happening.
In other words, you can’t ‘wait something‘, you have to ‘wait at’, ‘wait in’, ‘wait for’ etc.
Tardar behaves in almost exactly the same way, except its meaning is closer to the English verb ‘to delay’ or the construction ‘to take (time)’.
Tardar vs tardarse
In addition, you can use tardar as a normal verb, or you can use tardarse in a Spanish passive construction using the pronoun se.
Here is an example with tardar:
English: It took me two hours to get there on foot (I took…).
Español: Tardé dos horas en llegar a pie.
Note in English, we have a strange construction “it took me”, which is similar to Spanish verbs like gustar where the subject of the sentence is ‘it’.
In contrast, as a passive construction, tardarse flips the noun in the sentence from the person or thing that performs the action of the verb to the person or thing that experiences the action of the verb.
This idea is extremely difficult to express in English with the construction ‘to take time’. That’s why I chose the verb ‘to wait’ in the previous section, it is easier to use in a passive construction, and it behaves a lot like tardar.
For example:
I was waiting for the train. (active)
The train was being waited for. (passive)
This second sentence is similar to sentences with tardarse in Spanish.
Here is an example:
English: The train took two hours to get to Murcia.
Español: El tren se tardó dos horas en llegar a Murcia.
In this example, it is the 2-hour time period that is the most important part of this sentence, and so we use tardarse instead of tardar.
Moreover, we can easily remove ‘el tren‘ from this example:
English: It took two hours to get to Murcia.
Español: Se tardó dos horas en llegar a Murcia.
Note that we couldn’t remove ‘el tren‘ from the sentence if we were using the normal form of the verb tardar.
Here are a few example questions that further demonstrate the difference between tardar and tardarse.
English: How long did it take to get here? (passive)
Español: ¿Cuánto tiempo se tardó en llegar?
English: How long did it take you to get here? (active)
Español: ¿Cuánto tiempo tardaste en llegar?
Note the difference between “did it take” and “did it take you”.
Use 1. To take time
The first use of tardar (or tardarse) is equivalent to the English construction ‘to take time’.
You can use mucho in combination with tardar to say ‘to take a while’ or ‘to take a long time’.
For example:
English: You took a long time. What happened?
Español: Has tardado mucho. ¿Qué ha pasado?
Also, if you want to say ‘it took a while to… (finish, answer, fix, etc.)’ then you’ll need to combine tardar with the Spanish preposition en.
English: He took over an hour to decide which pants he wanted.
Español: Tardó más de una hora en decidir qué pantalones quería.
As you can see from this example ‘it took time to decide’ which is ‘tardar (tiempo) en decidir‘.
English: It only took 5 days to organise the conference this time.
Español: Esta vez sólo se tardó 5 días en organizar la conferencia.
Note the passive construction in this last example with tardarse. Who was organising the conference? It doesn’t matter! The fact that it took 5 days is the key to this sentence, so we use tardarse.
Use 2. To delay
In addition to tardar, there are other verbs in Spanish that are equivalent to the English verb ‘to delay’ such as retrasar and demorar.
In comparison to these other verbs, tardar works really well in the negative context of ‘not delaying’ or ‘without further delay’.
For example:
English: We must not delay in solving this problem.
Español: No debemos tardar en resolver este problema.
English: I can’t delay in answering their request.
Español: No puedo tardar en responder su petición.
English: We have to make these changes without any further delay.
Español: Tenemos que realizar estos cambios sin más tardar.
Use 3. At the latest – A más tardar
The last use of tardar is for setting deadlines in Spanish by using the translation of the English phrase ‘at the latest’, which is ‘a más tardar‘.
For example:
English: We have to finish the project by Friday at the latest
Español: Tenemos que terminar el proyecto el viernes a más tardar.
Also, note there is no preposition with the phrase ‘by Friday’ in Spanish. You simply say ‘el viernes‘ (the Friday).
English: The meeting will start in ten minutes at the latest.
Español: La reunión empieza a más tardar en diez minutos.
English: The car must be returned no later than 24 hours after leaving the car park.
Español: El coche se debe devolver a más tardar 24 horas después de salir del aparcamiento.
Your turn
Tardar is a really useful verb in the context of talking about a quantity of time or adding emphasis to ideas around delays and deadlines.
If there is something new to you in this article or something you would like to get to know better, try to use it a few times this week.
Test out the phrase ‘a más tardar‘, or ‘tardar‘ with the preposition ‘en‘, or even see if you can work a passive sentence with tardarse into your next Spanish conversation.
How else can you use the Spanish verb tardar?
How else can you use the Spanish verb tardar?
Great articles
Andrew, could you please refer me to the rule where one uses « en » before a verb as in « en llegar «
Thank you
Hola Marthe, there isn’t a rule that works well with all prepositions. But, usually, the “en” would go with the verb before it. E.g. “Voy a llegar”, the “a” goes with ‘voy’, “tardar en llegar” the “en” goes with ‘tardar’.
Could you send us the list of what you consider the most common/necessary 1000 words (mentioned above) for conversation? Thanks. It would be nice to memorize those words that we still do not know are so necessary.
Yes, you can access the list of the 1000 words by signing up for the conversation hacking guide. Look for the “download free guide” link on this page.
Awesome summary with use cases for this verb which I have struggled with for a long time. Really different construct than saying “I took” or “it took me”. I don’t think it clicked for me until reading this article how to use this correctly. Thanks for putting together
Thanks for the feedback Brian! I’m glad it helped 🙂
De nuevo Andrew, me gusta mucho recibir tus correos electrónicos.
Aqui es mi ejemplo, ‘Como siempre, debo escribir los verbos en español a más tardar el viernes por la noche’.
Muchisimas gracias, disfruta el fin de semana.
Christine
¡Gracias Christine! 🙂
I always try to find words with the same derivative in English as the “new”Spanish word, “tardy” being the obvious one here. Thank you for your article each week. This is a word that I have not encountered in my studies.
Thanks for sharing Roy! Just be careful with ‘tardy’, there is some overlap here in reference to time but ‘tardy’ is often used in a negative context and ‘tardar’ can be quite neutral.
A new word for me Tardar , I understand the way you simply explained it in different modes. Thanks so much hope I can attend your class soon. Gracias saludos desde filipinas .
Jovelyn
Thanks Jovelyn 🙂
another useful lesson. Is “en” the only preposition to be used:
Tardé dos horas en llegar a pie.
Or, could “de” be used: Tardé dos horas de llegar a pie.
Or “para” – Tardé dos horas para llegar a pie.?
Good question Garry!! “En” is the best choice here because it is the most common preposition in this context with tardar, we could also use “para” here, but we should avoid “de”.
Gracias Andrew. Esto fue muy útil. Noté que los ejemplos de ‘tardarse’ todos están conjugados en tercera persona del singular. Es siempre el caso? Recientemente encontré esta frase en un libro. “Se tarden cuatro horas en llegar”. Do you think this is a passive construction?
Gracias de antemano
Jennifer
Hola Jennifer, yes, that’s right, both options are possible here. 🙂
Sin más tardar, voy a decir muy bien trabajar aquí Andrew.
¡Gracias Dave! 🙂
I would instinctively use “para” instead of “en”, since the concept being conveyed is “in order to”. I live in Mexico, so I don’t know if that makes any difference. Is the use of “en” unique to following tadar? We would also say “Que pasó” in Mexico instead of “Que ha pasado”. I assume you are well aware that the pretérito is used much more in Mexico than in Spain.
Hola John, yes, as a general idea, it’s useful to try to learn verbs and prepositions together. In terms of the past simple vs present perfect, Mexico actually uses it the least in the Spanish-speaking world, e.g. less often than Peru and Colombia and Spain. But, Mexico still does use it, so students that are only interested in Mexican Spanish still have to know it. We have an article that covers the frequency usage of the present perfect throughout the Spanish-speaking world.
Andrew, did the train take two hours, or was it two hours late?
English: The train took two hours to get to Murcia.
Español: El tren se tardó dos horas en llegar a Murcia.
Hola Peg, in this case, it’s about the quantity of time “it took” to get there. We don’t know if the train is late or not in this sentence without further context.