How to Say I Miss You in Spanish

When you go abroad to learn Spanish, the experience is truly immersive; you get day-to-day Spanish conversation practice, learn about a new culture, and make new friends and connections. It’s fantastic to stay in touch after the trip too to keep practicing. Often students want to express to their host families, new colleagues, or friends, the people and things they miss back home. Likewise, once you get home, you might want to tell your sweet host mom or little best friend, the five-year-old in the house, that you miss them. How can you say, “I miss you?” in Spanish?

The first phrase to say I miss you and probably the most common is: te extraño. With this expression, you use the regular verb extrañar and up front, add the direct object pronouns: te or me (you or me). You can also use it with other people, things, or places. Let’s see some examples:

Extraño mi casa.	I miss home.
Extraño a mis amigos ticos.	I miss my Costa Rican friends.
¿Me extrañas?	Do you miss me?

LEVEL UP: if you’re having a conversation with someone in Spanish about the people you miss, you can use direct object pronouns to replace the people you miss in the sentence: lo, la, los, las. Let’s check some more examples below:

Extraño a mis amigos ticos.	Los extraño.	I miss them.
Extraño a mi hermana.	La extraño.	I miss her.
Ella extraña mucho a su novio.	Lo extraña mucho.	She misses him a lot.

Another great little phrase to express I miss you is me haces falta. The full form of the verb hacer falta means you need or are lacking something or someone. In this sense, it also can be used to state the people or things you miss. This phrase functions just like the verb gustar in that you have to conjugate the verb hacer for the person or thing you are missing. The indirect object pronoun (me, te, le, nos, les) refers to the person who is being affected; in English, it’d correspond to the subject. Unlike extrañar, you always have to use it with the pronoun. Let’s see some examples:

Me haces falta	I miss you.
¿Te hago falta?	Do you miss me?
Me hace falta la comida de mi país.	I miss the food from my country.

If you want to learn more about how indirect and direct object pronouns work in Spanish, CGI has a fantastic Spanish Lab for mastering this particular part of the grammar. You can get full access here. Each video lesson (3) are accompanied by fillable notes and homework as well as practice questions to start using these pronouns in your day-to-day Spanish speaking life!

This last phrase for how to say I miss you in Spanish, is one that is used more frequently in Spain. However, it’s still understood in Latin America, but not used as much. It works very similarly to extrañar, but also has an additional prepositional phrase attached (de menos). The verb echar literally means to pour or put something, but also forms part of many idiomatic expressions as well like this one. Let’s see some examples:

Me echas de menos.	You miss me.
La echo de menos.	I miss her.
Echo de menos las playas.	I miss the beaches.

Now that you know how to say I miss you and talk about people and things you miss, get ready to start using it today or on your next trip!

• High school students
• Families
• General Spanish students
• Health professionals
• Teachers

We look forward to having you join us on your next adventure!