Feelings in Spanish: emotions, estar and agreement

Asking and answering “How are you?”

• ¿Cómo estás?: How are you? (to one friend, tú)
• ¿Qué tal?: How’s it going? (informal, very common)
• ¿Cómo está usted?: How are you? (formal)
• ¿Cómo estáis?: to several people, in Spain; ¿Cómo están? everywhere else
• ¿Cómo te sientes?: How do you feel? (more personal)

The answers form a scale, from best to worst:

• ¡Genial!: great
• Muy bien.: very well
• Bien.: fine
• Regular. or Más o menos.: so-so
• Mal.: bad
• Fatal.: awful (informal, especially in Spain)

Then bounce the question back: ¿Y tú? Textbooks often teach así así for “so-so”; it exists, but regular and más o menos are far more natural.

Bien and mal are adverbs, so they never change: a girl says estoy bien, not “estoy buena”.

Adjectives of feeling

The masculine form is in the first column. Adjectives in -o change to -a in the feminine; the others stay the same.

Pronunciation tips: the d between vowels in cansado or enfadado is soft, close to the th of “this”, and in relaxed speech in Spain it almost disappears. The rr of aburrido is rolled. The j of enojado is the throaty sound of Scottish “loch”. The z of avergonzado and feliz is a th in most of Spain and an s in Latin America.

Agreement: contento or contenta?

1. -o becomes -a. Estoy cansado (boy), estoy cansada (girl). The adjective agrees with the person who feels, not with the question.
2. -e and consonant endings don’t change. triste, alegre, feliz are the same for everyone.
3. Plurals add -s or -es. contentos, tristes, felices (z becomes c). A mixed group takes the masculine: Estamos cansados.
4. Usted agrees with the real person. To a female teacher: ¿Está usted cansada?

Ser or estar?

Feelings are states, so they take estar: estoy triste, está nerviosa. Some adjectives change meaning with ser, which is worth showing to pupils from KS3:

Feliz works with both: soy feliz (I’m happy in life) and estoy feliz (I’m happy right now) are both correct.

Other ways to express feelings

Some feelings use tener + noun, where English uses “be” + adjective: tengo miedo (I’m scared), tengo sueño (I’m sleepy), tengo hambre (I’m hungry), tengo vergüenza (I’m embarrassed). “Very” is then mucho or mucha: tengo mucho miedo, tengo mucha hambre.

Others use the reflexive sentirse: me siento solo, me siento mejor. And many use a verb like gustar: me da miedo (it scares me), me pone nervioso (it makes me nervous).

Two more phrases pupils love, because they sound like real teenage Spanish: estoy de buen humor or de mal humor (I’m in a good or bad mood), and estoy harto or estoy harta (I’m fed up). Like the other adjectives, harto agrees with the speaker; humor does not change.

Estoy contenta porque es viernes.I’m happy because it’s Friday. (said by a girl)

Mi hermano está enfadado conmigo.My brother is angry with me.

Hoy estamos muy cansados.We’re very tired today.

Tengo miedo de las arañas.I’m scared of spiders.

Three false friends catch English speakers every year. Embarazada means pregnant, not embarrassed: use avergonzado/a or me da vergüenza. Excitado/a often has a sexual meaning: for “excited”, use emocionado/a or, in Spain, ilusionado/a. And estoy constipado means “I’ve got a cold”.

Typical mistakes of English-speaking learners

• Ser instead of estar: “Soy cansado” for estoy cansado.
• No agreement: a girl saying “estoy contento”. Train pupils to check their own ending.
• “Estoy bueno/buena”: this means “I’m good-looking” in colloquial Spanish. “I’m good” is estoy bien.
• Be + fear: “estoy miedo” instead of tengo miedo.
• “Estoy aburrido” and “soy aburrido” mixed up: bored versus boring.
• False friends: embarazada, excitado.
• Regional forms marked wrong: enojado is standard in Latin America, not a mistake.

In class: a feelings check-in

A daily check-in practises the most frequent verb in Spanish, estar, and makes agreement audible every single day.

1. Show a face on the board, for example someone yawning.
2. Ask ¿Cómo está? The class answers Está cansado or Está cansada.
3. Reveal both the masculine and feminine forms, so the agreement is visible to everyone.
4. Turn it round: Y tú, ¿cómo estás? Three or four pupils answer with their own ending.
5. Push for a reason: ¿Por qué? Estoy cansado porque tengo educación física.

That is exactly what a short daily routine offers: one structure, repeated with real variety, corrected on the spot.

A word of care: a check-in touches on real feelings. Let pupils give a “classroom answer” rather than their true mood if they prefer, and never insist.

Other activities: emotion charades, a “how would you feel if…” card game (Si pierdo el móvil, estoy…), or a feelings diary at the end of the week.

Adapting to your class

• A1One phrase: Estoy bien. Estoy cansada.
• A2Add a reason: Estoy contento porque hace sol.
• B1Past and change: Ayer estaba nerviosa, pero hoy estoy tranquila.
• B2Feelings with the subjunctive: Me alegra que estés aquí. Me preocupa que no haya tiempo.

At KS2, a feelings chart with faces is enough. At KS3, insist on estar and agreement. At GCSE, feelings run through every theme, from relationships to school pressure: Estoy agobiado por los exámenes.

Frequently asked questions