Spanish expressions: De verdad

Whether you speak English or Spanish, you can use words to modify or emphasize the way you do a task.

In English, you may know these words as adverbials.

Often, Spanish learners and even native speakers discuss how to use expressions like de verdad and verdaderamente.

Although they have similar purposes, we use them in different ways.

If you want to learn how to use these expressions properly, don’t hesitate and keep reading this article!

How to use “de verdad”

De verdad is a Spanish phrase we use to express how authentic or real something is.

Also, since it works as an adverbial, you can use it to describe the way you do an activity.

We often use this expression when we want to highlight how serious a situation or an action is.

Let’s look at the examples below to provide you with a better idea:

Yo tengo un trencito de juguete con humo de verdad.

I have a toy train with real smoke.

Quiero ir a Australia, de verdad.

I’ve always wanted to go to Australia, really.

De verdad, debemos cambiar la manera en la que jugamos o perderemos el campeonato.

Really, we have to change the way we play or we will lose the championship.

In the first example, you can see how de verdad emphasizes that the toy train produces real smoke.

In the third example, de verdad is giving a tone of seriousness because, otherwise, something bad might happened.

However, in the second example, de verdad just works as an expression to highlight how bad you want to go to Australia.

How to use “verdaderamente”

Just like de verdad, the word verdaderamente is an adverbial.

For that reason, we use it in a similar way.

In English, the equivalent word for verdaderamente is “truly”.

Nonetheless, depending on the way you use it, it can be “really” or “indeed”.

To get a clearer picture of how to use verdaderamente, let’s see the examples below:

Verdaderamente, te amo desde el primer momento que te vi.

Truly, I love you from the first moment I saw you.

Hacer lo que dijo María sería verdaderamente útil.

Doing what Maria said would be really helpful.

Yo, verdaderamente, habría esperado algo más.

I really would have expected more.

As you can see, in the first example, we use verdaderamente to emphasize how serious a feeling is.

Similarly, in the second example, we use verdaderamente to how helpful something is.

Also, we can use the word verdaderamente as an opposition.

Consequently, it should go between two commas and if we remove it, the sentence would not lose its meaning.

You can take for example the third sentence shown above.

The difference between verdaderamente and de verdad is that you can’t use verdaderamente after a noun to describe how real it is.

Let’s look at the following example to get a better understanding:

Yo tengo un trencito de juguete con humo de verdad.

Yo tengo un trencito de juguete con humo verdaderamente.

In the first sentence, we are using de verdad to express that the smoke is real.

Nevertheless, if we use verdaderamente after humo we are making a grammar mistake.

We can only use verdaderamente as shown below:

Yo tengo un trencito de juguete con humo, verdaderamente.

Verdaderamente, yo tengo un trencito de juguete con humo.

As you may notice, we add a comma if verdaderamente goes after humo.

In this case, we are just emphasizing that we have a toy train.

By using verdaderamente, we can’t say if the smoke is real or not.

How to put “de verdad” and “verdaderamente” in a sentence.

Placing these expressions in a sentence is very easy.

The only thing you have to pay attention to is where to put the comma.

For example, if you start a sentence using de verdad or verdaderamente we should use a comma right after.

Take, for example, the following sentence:

Verdaderamente / de verdad , quiero ir a comer torta.

Something similar would happen if we place verdaderamente and de verdad at the end of the sentence.

In this case, the comma should go just before:

Necesito vacaciones, verdaderamente / de verdad.

Additionally, you can use both expressions as an apposition but they should go between two commas just as shown below:

Yo, verdaderamente / de verdad, no lo puedo creer.

Finally, it’s important to use commas properly.

Otherwise, you might accidentally change the meaning of the sentence.

Let’s see another example with the toy train sentence:

Yo tengo un trencito de juguete con humo de verdad.

Yo tengo un trencito de juguete con humo, de verdad.

In the first sentence, as you already know, we are saying that the smoke is real.

On the flip side, in the second sentence, we emphasize that we have a toy train.