Spanish words ending in -MENTE

Welcome 😊 to our grammar lesson on Spanish words that end in -mente.

Adverbs ending in -mente (such as “normalmente” or “simplemente”) are the equivalent of English words ending in “-ly”: usually, simply, etc.

By the end of this lesson, you will be able to take any adjective and transform it into an adverb ending in -mente.

You will also find a Quiz and an Exercise to practice.

How to form adverbs ending in “-mente”

In order to form these adverbs, we follow 3 steps:

1. Think of any adjective
2. Take the feminine form of that adjective
3. Add -mente to that feminine form

Let’s pick a few adjectives and transform them into -mente adverbs, following the steps we just learned:

1. Think of any adjective

I just thought of these four adjectives! 😊

• desgraciado = unfortunate
• intenso = intense
• fácil = easy
• alegre = happy

2. Take the feminine form of that adjective

Out of the four adjectives I thought, the first two have a feminine form that is different from the masculine.

For the other two, the feminine form is the same as the masculine.

Adjective	Feminine form
desgraciado	desgraciada
intenso	intensa
fácil	fácil
alegre	alegre

3. Add “-mente” to that feminine form

This is the final step. Let’s complete our table and see the results:

Adjective	Feminine form	Adverb ending in "-mente"
desgraciado	desgraciada	desgraciadamente
intenso	intensa	intensamente
fácil	fácil	fácilmente
alegre	alegre	alegremente

We have followed the steps successfully, and obtained four adverbs ending in -mente:

• desgraciadamente = unfortunately
• intensamente = intensely
• fácilmente = easily
• alegremente = happily

Note: about accent marks

An adverb with “mente” has an accent mark if and only if the original adjective had it too, and it stays on the same vowel.

For example, out of the four adverbs we have formed, only “fácilmente” has an accent mark, because “fácil” had it too.

Example sentences

Finally, here are some sentences with the “-mente” adverbs we just formed:

Desgraciadamente, no tengo tiempo para viajar.
Unfortunately, I don’t have time to travel.

Ella trabaja intensamente.
She works intensely.

Paula resuelve fácilmente los problemas.
Paula solves the problems easily.

Los niños cantan alegremente.
The children sing happily.

List of common “-mente” adverbs

Here’s a list of common -mente adverbs, and the adjectives they come from:

Adjective	Adverb ending in "-mente"	Meaning
absoluto	absolutamente	absolutely
afortunado	afortunadamente	luckily
breve	brevemente	briefly
casual	casualmente	casually, incidentally
claro	claramente	clearly
completo	completamente	completely
especial	especialmente	specially
final	finalmente	finally
honesto	honestamente	honestly
lento	lentamente	slowly
ligero	ligeramente	slightly
necesario	necesariamente	necessarily
normal	normalmente	normally, usually
principal	principalmente	mainly
rápido	rápidamente	quickly
simple	simplemente	simply
sincero	sinceramente	sincerely
total	totalmente	totally
triste	tristemente	sadly
tranquilo	tranquilamente	calmly
último	últimamente	lately
paciente	pacientemente	patiently

Practice

Quiz

Take this short Quiz about words ending in -mente:

Exercise 1

Fill the gaps using -mente adverbs created from the adjectives in brackets. Click on the gray spaces to see the solutions:

1) Tenemos que hacer las cosas correctamente . (correcto)
We have to do things correctly.

2) Ella es simplemente genial. (simple)
She’s simply great.

3) El anillo me parece excesivamente caro. (excesivo)
The ring seems excessively expensive to me.

Exercise 2

More sentences!:

4) Antonio es un profesional tremendamente eficaz. (tremendo)
Antonio is a tremendously effective professional.

5) El tema está perfectamente claro. (perfecto)
The issue is perfectly clear.

6) Nosotros vamos al cine frecuentemente . (frecuente).
We go to the movies frequently.