Hello there!

Many students ask me about the difference in Spanish language between ‘me alegra’ and ‘me alegro’. I am going to give you -I hope- a very easy explanation using some analogies.

• ‘Me alegra’ works like ‘me gusta’: It works just the same way than “GUSTAR”, “ENCANTAR”, “FALTAR”, etc.

Example: Me alegra tu visita.

Something makes me happy. In this case, your visit MAKES me happy. It also works with plural if that something that makes me happy is plural: Tus canciones me alegran (Your songs make me happy).

–> Of course you can use it for all persons: (a mí) me alegra(n), (a tí) te alegra(n), (a él/ella/usted) le alegra(n), (a nosotros) nos alegra(n), (a vosotros) os alegra(n), (a ellos/ellas/ustedes) les alegra(n).

–>  In German, the translation would be: Es freut mich.(Etwas produziert Freude auf mich). The example would be translated as “Deine Lieder freuen mich“.

–> Grammar: in the example “Tus canciones me alegran” we can see that “tus canciones” is the subject, and “alegrar” is working as a transitive verb.

• ‘Me alegro’ works like ‘Me llamo’: the verb is simply reflexive.

Example: A conversation between two friends:

–  (Amigo 1) ¡He conseguido trabajo!

– (Amigo 2) ¡Me alegro!¡Yuhu!

The infinitive is “alegrarse”, just the same way as “llamarse”, so we need to use it with the reflexive pronoun (me, te, se, nos, os, se) + conjugation of the other part of the verb (alegro, alegras, alegra, alegramos, alegráis, alegran), so we will have:

–> Me alegro, te alegras, se alegra, nos alegramos, os alegráis, se alegran.

–> You can add extra information after “Me alegro” to explain why you are happy about: Me alegro por + sustantivo (Me alegro por tu nuevo trabajo), o Me alegro de que + frase subordinada (Me alegro de que tengas un nuevo trabajo).

–>  In German, the translation would be: Ich freue mich (auch reflexiv auf Deutsch, oder?)

–> Grammar: as I said before, in this case we are having a reflexive use of the verb.

I hope this was useful. If you have any questions, let me know.

🙂