What are direct object pronouns in Italian?

Direct object pronouns are words like mi (meaning me), ti (meaning you), lo (meaning him), la (meaning her), or ci (meaning us), that replace a person/thing that is the direct object of a sentence. You use direct object pronouns in English too. In fact, you use them all the time! But in Italian, direct object pronouns often come before the verb and not after!

In this post, we’ll review the direct object pronouns in Italian and talk about where to put them in a sentence, and show you some special rules about using direct object pronouns in compound tenses like the passato prossimo. Let’s check them out!

In Italian we use direct object pronouns (or DOPs) to replace the direct object of a verb. This is usually the noun that is directly affected by or directly undergoes the action. Importantly, the direct object of a verb will never come after a preposition.

In Italian, there are two different types of direct object pronouns, and we use them in slightly different circumstances:

• Unstressed DOPs → these are the most common

• Stressed DOPs → these are only used for emphasis (we’ll talk more about them below!)

We’ll talk first about unstressed DOPs, then we can look at the stressed ones. Let’s get going!

The unstressed direct object pronouns in Italian are given in the table below.

A few things to keep in mind:

• There is no “it,” in Italian! Use the gender of the noun to decide whether you should use la (feminine), or lo (masculine).

• We use il for "they" unless you are talking about a group that is 100% feminine, in which case you can use le.

Now that we know the forms, let's learn three simple steps for how to put them in a sentence:

1. Find the direct object of the sentence.

   The subject of a sentence answers the question “who verbed?”

   The direct object of a sentence answers the questions “verbed what?” or “verbed who?” and it is the person/thing that receives the action of the verb.

   subjectverbdirect object

   Marina ha ordinato quattro pizze.

   Translation: Marina ordered four pizzas.

   • Who ordered? Marina → Marina is the subject

   • Ordered what? Four pizzas → Four pizzas is the direct object! ✌

2. What’s the English direct object pronoun?

   Think of how you would ask in English, “Has Marina ordered the four pizzas?” without repeating “four pizzas”:

   Has Marina ordered them?

3. What’s the Italian equivalent?

   When we consult the table above, we see that “them” in Italian can be either il or le. How do we decide?

   Because the object we’ve replaced, pizze, is feminine plural, the pronoun will be le, as they need to agree.

   Result:

   Le ha ordinate?

   How could we answer this question with a DOP? 🤔

   Marina le ha ordinate ieri sera.

   Translation: Marina ordered them yesterday evening.

There are two big differences between the original sentence, Maria ha ordinato quattro pizze, and the final sentence Marina le ha ordinate:

• The verb is different! In the full form it is ha ordinato, when we used the direct object pronoun, we said ha ordinate. The past participle agrees with le!

• The word order is different! In the full form, quattro pizze came after the verb, but le comes before the verb.

Let’s talk first about when and why the past participle agrees with the direct object pronoun, and then we can go through the rules about where to put direct object pronouns in a sentence.

The past participle will agree with the gender and number a direct object pronoun in compound tenses that use the verb avere (meaning have).

There are four main compound tenses in Italian: passato prossimo (meaning present perfect), trapassato prossimo (meaning past perfect), futuro anteriore (meaning future perfect), trapassato remoto (meaning past anterior). These can technically be formed in two ways: essere (meaning be) + past participle, or avere (meaning have) + past participle.

But avere (meaning to have) is the auxiliary for all transitive verbs (those verbs that have a direct object). This means that if we’re using a DOP, the compound tense of that verb is always formed with avere.

So, any time you use a direct object pronoun with a compound tense, the past participle will need to agree in gender and number with the object! The endings are the same as for adjectives:

• masculine singular: -o

• feminine singular: -a

• masculine plural: -i

• feminine plural: -e

Let’s look at an example in the passato prossimo, as this is the most-used past tense in Italian:

• Hai chiamato Lucia?

  Translation: Did you call Lucia?
• Sì, l’ho chiamata e ci ha invitato a vedere la partita insieme.

  Translation: Yes, I called her and she invited us to watch the soccer game together.

  Lucia (f. sg.) becomes la, la becomes l' before “h”, and the past participle becomes chiamata
• Perfetto! Ha invitato anche Matteo?

  Translation: Perfect! Did she invite Matteo as well?
• SÌ, l’ha invitato.

  Translation: Yes, she invited him.

  Matteo (m. sg.) becomes lo, lo becomes l' before “h”, and the past participle stays invitato (because the default ending is the same as the masculine singular one)
  Ha detto che preparerà le patate al limone.

  Translation: He said he will make lemon roasted potatoes.
• Non le ho mai provate… come sono?

  Translation: I have never tried them… what are they like?

  patate (f. pl.) becomes le, and the past participle becomes provate
• Sono deliziose!

  Translation: They are delicious!
  Ehi, hai comprato i profiteroles al cioccolato bianco che Lucia adora?

  Translation: Hey, did you buy the white chocolate profiteroles that Lucia loves?
• Non ancora, ma li ho prenotati in pasticceria!

  Translation: Not yet, but I have reserved them at the pastry shop!

  profiteroles (m. pl.) becomes il, and the past participle becomes prenotati

Notice that when we replace the direct object noun with a DOP, we place it in front of avere and we do the gender and number agreement between the DOP and the past participle of the compound verb.

In Italian, we most often put direct object pronouns before the verb. For example:

However, there are five situations in which the pronoun comes after the verb. Let’s go over these situations next!

Here are the most important take-aways about direct object pronouns in Italian:

• Direct object pronouns replace the object of a sentence that has been previously mentioned

• When “it” is the direct object, we translate it as either la or lo, depending on the gender of the object

• “Them” in Italian is masculine plural li unless all the nouns in the group are feminine, in which case it is le

• La and lo before a vowel or an “h” become l', while le and li stay the same

• There are four steps to identify and use the correct DOP

  1. Find the direct object

  2. Think of the English DOP for that object

  3. Find the Italian equivalent

  4. In tenses like passato prossimo, the past participle agrees in gender and number with the object

• DOPs go before the verb, unless you have an imperative, an infinitive, a gerund, the expression ecco, or are using a stressed direct object pronoun.

Now, click the link to practice Direct Object Pronouns in Italian!