to say
Reporting words, usually followed by că + a clause, or by direct speech.
Ce ai spus?
What did you say?
Spune că vine.
He says he is coming.
#27 · Verb
spune
In Romanian, spune means “to say”. It’s the #27 most frequently used Romanian word. Below you’ll find how to use it, its forms, real example sentences, and common word pairings.
Meaning & Use
The 27th most frequent word and Romania's verb of reporting: a spune covers both English "say" and "tell". Two of its forms carry most of the load — the participle spus (am spus, mi-a spus, cum se spune) and the 3rd-person spune. It is a 3rd-conjugation verb in -e, so its stress stays on the stem, and it almost always appears with a dative pronoun: îmi spune, îți spun, ne-a spus.
neutralto tell (someone something)
Same verb, with a dative pronoun for the person told — Romanian does not have a separate "tell".
Îți spun un secret.
I'll tell you a secret.
Nu-mi spune!
Don't tell me!
to be called / to be said (se spune)
The impersonal reflexive: how something is expressed, or what people say in general.
Cum se spune în română?
How do you say it in Romanian?
Se spune că e adevărat.
They say it's true.
to mean something to someone (îmi spune ceva)
Idiomatic: numele nu-mi spune nimic = "the name means nothing to me".
Numele nu-mi spune nimic.
The name doesn't ring a bell.
Îți spune ceva?
Does that mean anything to you?
Forms you’ll actually hear
Ranked by how often each form shows up in spoken Romanian. The top 4 forms cover about 92% of everyday use — learn these first.
spus34%
spune26%
spun17%
spui14%
Show 12 more forms
spuneți2%
spună2%
spunem1%
spunea1%
spuneam<1%
spunând<1%
spuneai<1%
spuse<1%
spuneau<1%
spunându<1%
spusese<1%
spusă<1%
Conjugation
- Infinitive
- a spune
- Past Participle
- spus
- Gerund
- spunând
- Imperative Singular
- spune
- Imperative Plural
- spuneți
- Auxiliary
- a avea
- Reflexive
- No
- Transitivity
- transitive
| Tense | eu | tu | el/ea | noi | voi | ei/ele |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Present | spun | spui | spune | spunem | spuneți | spun |
| Imperfect | spuneam | spuneai | spunea | spuneam | spuneați | spuneau |
| Perfect compus | am spus | ai spus | a spus | am spus | ați spus | au spus |
| Future | voi spune | vei spune | va spune | vom spune | veți spune | vor spune |
| Conditional | aș spune | ai spune | ar spune | am spune | ați spune | ar spune |
| Subjunctive | să spun | să spui | să spună | să spunem | să spuneți | să spună |
- eu and ei/ele share the present form spun; only context or a pronoun tells them apart.
- The 3rd-person subjunctive is irregular in shape: să spună, not *să spune.
- The simple past spuse and pluperfect spusese exist but are literary — in speech use am spus.
- Clitics attach to the imperative with a hyphen (spune-mi, spuneți-ne) and precede every other form (îmi spune, mi-a spus).
Examples
Cum se spune "thank you" în română?
How do you say "thank you" in Romanian?
se spune - The single most useful sentence for a learner. Impersonal reflexive: se + 3rd-singular spune, no subject.
Ți-am spus deja.
I already told you.
spus - Perfect compus with the auxiliary a avea; the dative clitic îți contracts to ți- before am.
Spune-mi ce s-a întâmplat.
Tell me what happened.
spune-mi - The singular imperative is just spune, with the pronoun hooked on behind by a hyphen.
Nu-mi spune ce să fac.
Don't tell me what to do.
nu spune - The negative imperative uses nu + the infinitive form, which for this verb happens to look identical: nu spune.
Vreau să-ți spun ceva.
I want to tell you something.
să spun - After vreau the second verb goes into the subjunctive; să + ți contracts to să-ți.
Bunica spunea mereu asta.
Grandma always used to say that.
spunea - Imperfect for a repeated habit in the past — the tense of storytelling.
The person you tell goes in the dative, as a clitic pronoun, not as a direct object: îmi spune ("he tells me"), îți spun, îi spun lui Ion. Saying *mă spune is wrong — that would make "me" the thing being said.
In expressions
Common phrases built around spune — worth learning as whole units.
vrei să spui— you mean (to say)
lit. “you-want that you-say”
Ce vrei să spui?— What do you mean?
lit. “what you-want that you-say”
se spune— it's said, people say
lit. “it says”
a spune adevărul— to tell the truth
lit. “to tell the-truth”
Corpus examples
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What do you mean?
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What do you mean?
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What do you mean?