In today’s lesson, we will introduce the basic vocabulary and expressions for making physical descriptions in Spanish in a very simple way. You will learn how to describe people in Spanish with a very few verbs and some common adjectives. There are helpful activities at the end of the lesson to practice as well. Ready?

Let’s see some examples of physical descriptions in Spanish first.

She is a very pretty girl. She is a brunette with curly hair and black eyes.

This boy is brown, has brown eyes, wears glasses and beard.

This girl is blond, she has blue eyes. She wears two braids, she wears a pink T-shirt.

As you can see in the examples, to describe physical appearance of people in Spanish we mainly use three verbs:

SER «to be» in English

TENER «to have» in English

LLEVAR «to wear» in English

Now let’s look at the possible combinations with each of these verbs.

How to describe people in Spanish

THE PHYSICAL APPEARANCE

SER

We use the verb SER, «to be» in English to talk about natural or permanent physical characteristics. The formula is: Tener (conjugated) + adjective.

Alto-a / Bajo-a	Short / Tall	Delgado-a / Gordo-a	Thin / fat
Feo-a / Guapo-a	Ugly / handsome – Pretty	Mayor / Joven	Old / Young
Calvo-a	bald	Moreno-a	dark-haired dark-skinned
Castaño-a	brown-haired	Rubio-a	blond
Pelirrojo-a	red-haired

Notice that these adjectives must agree with the person in gender (feminine and masculine) and number (singular or plural).

La chica es guapa / Las chicas son guapas.

El chico es guapo / Los chicos son guapos.

Usually to softer negative adjectives we place before the adjective : » un poco» = «a bit».

El chico es un poco feo.

La chica es un poco gorda /gordita.

TENER

To describe the hair, eyes, nose and other parts of the body of people in Spanish, we use the irregular verb TENER. The formula is: Tener (conjugated) + noun + adjective.

Pelo rizado	Curly hair	Pelo ondulado	Wavy hair	Pelo liso	Straight hair
Pelo corto	Short hair	Pelo largo	Long hair	Pelo recogido	hair up
Pelo suelto	hair down	Pelo moreno	dark hair	Pelo castaño	Brown hair
Pelo rubio	blond hair	Pelo pelirrojo	red hair	Pelo canoso / teñido	grey hair dyed hair

The word for hair (el pelo) is masculine and singular, so the adjectives to describe hair must agree with the word pelo by also being masculine and singular and not with the person you are describing.

EXAMPLES

Ella tiene el pelo pelirrojo.

Él tiene el pelo pelirrojo

Ojos negros	Black eyes	Ojos marrones	Brown eyes
Ojos verdes	Green eyes	Ojos azules	Blue eyes
Nariz grande / pequeña	Big / Small nose	Un lunar / Pecas	beauty mark / Freckles

The word for eyes (los ojos) is masculine and plural, so the adjectives to describe eyes must also be masculine and plural.

EXAMPLE

Ella tiene los ojos verdes

Notice that there are the two different words for brown: «marrón» and «castaño«

Use «marrones» when talking about eye colour and «castaño» when talking about hair colour.

EXAMPLES

Mi madre tiene los ojos marrones / My mother has brown eyes.

Yo tengo el pelo castaño / I have brown hair.

LLEVAR

We use the verb «LLEVAR» to talk about physical characteristics that can change according to fashion or to talk about accessories and clothes that we can wear.

Coleta	ponytail	Trenzas	plaits
Perilla	goatee	Bigote	moustache
Barba	beard	Pendientes	earrings
Gafas	glasses	Collar	necklace
Camiseta	T-shirt	Pantalón	trousers

How to describe people in Spanish.

Let’s practice with interactive activities!

EXERCISE 1

EXERCISE 2

EXERCISE 3

EXERCISE 4

How to describe people in Spanish

Practice at your own pace…

That is all! I hope you’ve learned a lot, and you enjoyed this lesson! If you Iiked it, maybe you could be interested in this article: How to describe people’s personality in Spanish