Preparar is a regular -ar verb in Spanish.
Practice preparar free →Preparar means 'to prepare', and it is a regular -ar verb that fits food, school and routine topics neatly. Preparo la cena (I prepare dinner), me preparo para el examen (I'm getting ready for the exam). The reflexive prepararse means to get yourself ready. Because preparing — meals, for exams, for trips — appears across so many everyday situations, preparar is a dependable verb for describing what you do. As a regular -ar verb the conjugation is straightforward, and pairing it with time expressions makes for natural, developed sentences.
Quick facts
Preparar (to prepare) is a regular -ar verb.
Real sentences across different tenses — the kind of thing you'd actually say or write.
Preparo la comida (I prepare the food).
Reflexive prepararse: me preparo para salir.
Prepararse para el examen (to prepare for the exam).
Useful for describing meals and daily routine.
Fixed expressions worth knowing — they come up in listening, reading and writing tasks.
Idiomatic expressions
Preparar is a regular verb. Make sure you know the endings for each tense — especially the preterite and subjunctive, which is where marks are most often lost.
preparar is a regular -ar verb — it follows the standard -ar pattern in every tense. That makes it a good one to drill: if you know preparar, you know the template for all regular -ar verbs.
Type conjugations from memory and get instant feedback. That's how you actually build the automatic recall the exam needs — not from reading tables.
Practice preparar now →Three questions. Press Enter to check each answer.
yo: preparo, tú: preparas, él: prepara, nosotros: preparamos, vosotros: preparáis, ellos: preparan
Preparar is a regular -ar verb following the standard -ar pattern.
Use preparar in multiple tenses to show range — present, preterite and future at minimum. This is a key criterion for higher GCSE marks.
Verbs that are easy to confuse with preparar or that behave like it.
This reference is written for UK GCSE and A-Level Spanish learners and their teachers. It is designed for exam revision: every form is checked against standard conjugation rules, and the examples reflect the registers and topics that come up in the AQA, Edexcel and Eduqas specifications. Preparar is a high-frequency verb and appears often in exam papers. For active recall, use the free practice tool rather than only reading the tables.