In short

The present conditional is the “would” tense: vorrei un caffè = I would like a coffee. It is built on exactly the same stem as the simple future, plus the endings -ei, -esti, -ebbe, -emmo, -este, -ebbero. Use it to ask politely, to express a wish, to give advice, to soften an opinion, and to report news you cannot confirm.

The rule

The conditional is a mood, not a tense: it presents an action as depending on something else - a condition, a wish, someone’s permission, someone else’s word. In practice, most of the time it does in Italian what would + verb does in English.

Step 1 - take the future stem. Whatever stem you used for the simple future, you use again here. That means the whole irregular list is already learned: if the future is avrò, the conditional is avrei; if it is sarò, it is sarei; if it is verrò, it is verrei.

Step 2 - add the conditional endings. They are the same for all three conjugations: -ei, -esti, -ebbe, -emmo, -este, -ebbero. There is only one set of endings in the whole conditional, which makes it one of the cheapest forms in Italian to learn.

The five jobs it does:

• Polite request. The plain present sounds blunt; the conditional makes it courteous. Voglio un caffè is I want a coffee; Vorrei un caffè is I would like a coffee. Potresti aiutarmi? Could you help me? This is the single most frequent use, above all with volere, potere, dovere, essere and avere.
• Wish / desire. Mi piacerebbe visitare Roma. I would like to visit Rome. Note that the wish is often left hanging, without any if-clause at all.
• Advice. Dovresti riposare. You should rest. Dovere in the conditional is the normal way to say should / ought to. Al posto tuo, andrei dal medico. In your place, I would go to the doctor.
• Attenuated opinion. The conditional takes the edge off a statement you do not want to impose. Direi di sì. I’d say so. Sarebbe meglio partire presto. It would be better to leave early.
• Unconfirmed report. Journalism and hearsay: the conditional marks information you are passing on but not vouching for. Secondo il giornale, il ministro sarebbe malato. According to the paper, the minister is (reportedly) ill.

Two boundaries worth fixing now. First, English would also means “used to” for repeated past habits - that is not the conditional; Italian uses the imperfect for that (see The imperfect tense). Second, the conditional you are learning here talks about the present or the future. For “I would have done it” you need the past conditional, a different form covered later.

Forms & patterns

Regular conjugation. The -are verbs change their a to e in the stem, exactly as in the future: parlare -> parler-.

The irregular stems are the future’s, unchanged:

Spelling: verbs in -care / -gare keep the hard sound with an h (cercare -> cercherei, pagare -> pagherei); verbs in -ciare / -giare drop the i (cominciare -> comincerei, mangiare -> mangerei).

Direct blunt vs conditional polite:

Examples

Common mistakes

• Io volerei un caffè. -> Io vorrei un caffè. The conditional uses the future stem, not the infinitive: volere -> vorr-, never voler-.
• Quando ero bambino, andrei al mare ogni estate. -> Quando ero bambino, andavo al mare ogni estate. English would for a past habit is the Italian imperfetto, not the conditional.
• Noi parleremo con lui adesso, se potessimo. -> Noi parleremmo con lui adesso, se potessimo. Watch the double m: parleremo is the future (“we will speak”), parlerEMMO is the conditional (“we would speak”). One letter, two tenses.
• Loro verrebbono domani. -> Loro verrebbero domani. The 3rd person plural ending is -ebbero, stressed on its first e: verrèbbero.
• Cercherei / Mangerei mixed up as cercerei / mangierei -> cercherei, mangerei. Same spelling rules as the future: -care/-gare add h, -ciare/-giare drop the i.

Tips

• One stem, two moods. Every hour spent on the future was also an hour spent on the conditional. If you can say farò, you already know farei; if you hesitate on rimarrei, revise The simple future rather than this lesson.
• Learn the five workhorses as vocabulary, not grammar: vorrei (I’d like), potresti (could you), dovresti (you should), sarebbe (it would be), mi piacerebbe (I’d love to). These five cover most of what a B1 speaker actually needs, and they make you sound instantly more polite than the present.
• Double consonant, double meaning. The two forms learners confuse are noi: future -emo (parleremo), conditional -emmo (parleremmo). Say them out loud - the conditional’s m is genuinely long.
• The conditional does not need an “if”. Italian happily leaves the condition unspoken (Vorrei uscire - I’d like to go out). When you do want to spell out an unreal condition, you need se + the imperfect subjunctive, which is a later step.