Prepositions are special. They are little words, like “in” or “of,” that are packed with meaning! Have you ever wondered why we say “in the evening” and “at night”? Students often worry at the thought of learning prepositions, but these words are very important. They are the “glue” that connects nouns, pronouns, or phrases to other words in a sentence.
In this post, we’ll show you how to use Spanish prepositions of time (a, de, por, para, en, desde, hasta, durante, tras, and entre) to talk about dates, months, the hour, and much more! Are you ready? Let’s do this!
Spanish prepositions of time
The Spanish prepositions of time are: a, de, por, para, en, desde, hasta, durante, tras, and entre. Let’s go over them one by one.
‘A’
The preposition a can mean “at” and is used when talking about the hour:
Usualmente llego a casa a las 5.Translation: I usually get home at 5.A can also mean “after” to indicate the period of time after something happened:
Se casaron a los seis meses.Translation: They got married after six months.
‘De’
One of the uses of the preposition de is to introduce a part of the day corresponding to an hour:
Termino de estudiar a las 8 de la noche.Translation: I finish studying at 8 in the evening.Use the preposition de for the following periods of the day: de día meaning at daytime, de noche meaning at night time, or de madrugada meaning at dawn.
Prefiero estudiar de noche.Translation: I prefer to study at night time.You can also use de (combined with a) to indicate the starting and ending points of an action or situation:
Anoche estudié de 8 a 10.Translation: Last night I studied from 8 to 10.
With the combo de…a... we don’t need the definite article (la, las) we typically use to tell the time!
There’s another combo we can use to express starting and ending points of an action. To find out, let’s keep reading!
‘Por’
Por can mean “for” when we want to express the duration of an activity or event:
Comimos por dos horas.Translation: We ate for two hours.Use por + the definite article la to indicate a part of the day:
Por la mañana me gusta hacer ejercicio.Translation: In the morning, I like to work out.
We use the article la because the parts of the day in Spanish are feminine: la mañana meaning the morning, la tarde meaning the afternoon, la noche meaning the evening.
‘Para’
To talk about deadlines or a specific destination in time, use para meaning for, by
When the deadline is a day of the week, use the definite article el; and when it’s an hour, use the definite article la/las.
If you’re ready to learn more uses of the prepositions por and para, don’t miss the post we’ve written on it!
‘En’
This one is easy. Whenever we want to talk about months, seasons, and years, we introduce them with the preposition en meaning in
Simple, right?
We can also use en to introduce a period of time in the future in which something is going to happen or is expected to happen:
En una hora termino el examen.Translation: I’ll finish the test in an hour.Finally, we can use en in phrases such as en este momento meaning in this moment, en ese momento meaning in that moment, en cualquier momento meaning in any moment, en algún momento meaning sometime/at some point, or en ningún momento meaning neverliterally at no moment:
En este momento estoy muy ocupada.Translation: At the moment, I’m very busy.
As you can see, en is a pretty versatile preposition!
‘Desde’
If you want to indicate when an action started, desde meaning since is your go-to preposition:
You can add years, months, days, hours, or time phrases, such as el año pasado meaning last year after desde.
‘Hasta’
Just as with desde, we can use hasta meaning until to indicate when an action or situation ended:
You can also use hasta to mean “see you (on)” in expressions like ¡Hasta mañana! meaning see you tomorrowliterally until tomorrow or with days of the week: ¡Hasta el miércoles! meaning see you on Wednesdayliterally until Wednesday.
‘Durante’
If you want to emphasize the duration of an action or event, then the preposition you need is durante meaning during:
‘Tras’
You can use the preposition tras meaning after as a synonym of después de meaning after. Use it to indicate that one event happened after another:
‘Entre’
Finally, we have the preposition entre meaning between that can be used to indicate an intermediate situation, or a period of time between two different hours, days, weeks, years, etc.:
What are other types of prepositions in Spanish? I’m glad you asked, we also have prepositions of place and movement in Spanish, for which we also have a post! And while you’re at it, check out how to use prepositions with Spanish interrogative words and a post on the most common prepositions in Spanish!
To sum up
Today we’ve learned all about the prepositions of time in Spanish — the “glue” that will connect your nouns, pronouns, or phrases together! It’s OK to fret a bit (especially since there are quite a few to remember), but with practice, I’m sure you’ll get used to them naturally. Here’s a little table we’ve created to help you remember when to use each. Print it and keep it handy! You can also check out this short post and video that summarizes the prepositions of time.
And since you’ve shown so much enthusiasm about prepositions of time, how about checking what you’ve learned with this activity? ¡Hasta pronto! meaning See you soon!
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