Hey buddies!, a veces cosas tan sencillas como hablar sobre nuestras preferencias puede resultar un poco lioso cuando empezamos a mezclar expresiones con los verbos prefer, like better y would rather. Hoy os damos las claves (y muchos ejemplos) para saber cómo utilizar cada uno de ellos de manera correcta.

En inglés hay varias estructuras que podemos usar para expresar preferencias:

Which do you prefer tea or coffee? I prefer tea to coffee.
Which do you like better coke or pepsi? I like coke better than pepsi.
Do you prefer beer drinking beer or wine? I prefer drinking beer to wine.
Would you prefer to live in a big city or in a small town? I’d prefer living in a big city to living in a small town.
Would you rather take a nap? I‘d rather take a nap than go for a walk.

Vamos a ver estas estructuras una por una:

Prefer (something) to (something)

E.g.
I prefer tea to coffee.
I prefer beer to wine.
Which do you prefer coffee or tea?
Do you prefer coffee or hot chocolate?

Prefer (doing something) to (doing something)

E.g.
I prefer drinking beer to (drinking) wine.
I prefer reading a book to going for a walk.
I prefer watching series to reading books.
Do you prefer watching series or reading books?

Like (something) better than (something)

E.g.
I like coke better than pepsi.
I like the beach better than the mountain.
Which do you like better the beach or the mountain?
Which do you like better beer or wine?

Like (doing something) better than (doing something)
E.g.
I like living in a city better than (living) in the countryside.
I like reading a book better than going for a walk.
Which do you like better going for a walk or reading a book?
Which do you like better visiting monuments or museums?

Would prefer (something) to (something)

E.g.
I’d prefer a big city to a small town. > I’d (I would)
I’d prefer a bicycle to an electric scooter.
I’d prefer an ice cream to a pizza.
Would you prefer a pizza to an ice cream?

Would prefer (doing something) to (doing something)

E.g.
I’d prefer going for a walk to watching series.
I’d prefer eating out to cooking.
I’d prefer having more time to having more money.
Would you prefer eating out or cooking dinner tonight?
Would you prefer watching series or going for a walk?

Would rather (do something) than (do something)

E.g.
I’d rather stay at home than go out.
I’d rather take a nap than go for a walk.
I’d rather have more time than (have) more money.
Would rather take a nap than go for a walk?
Would you rather have more time than money?
Would you rather visit a big city than live there?

Para expresar preferencias podeis utilizar cualquiera de ellas, pero prestad atención a las diversas variantes con to or con than / better than y el uso de los verbos en infinitivo con / sin «to» o bien en gerundio «-ing».

Un breve resumen

Prefer (something) to (something)
Prefer (doing something) to (doing something)
Like (something) better than (something)
Like (doing something) better than (doing something)
Would prefer (something) to (something)
Would prefer (doing something) to (doing something)
Would rather (do something) than (do something)

Esperamos que todos estos ejemplos te hayan ayudado a ver las diferencias de uso y que a partir de ahora utilices algunas de estas expresiones para hablar sobre tus gustos y preferencias en inglés.

Hoy os traemos algunos trucos para decir y escribir correctamente la fecha en inglés.

Hay que tener en cuenta sobre todo:

-si es escrito o hablado
-si es inglés británico o americano

Te lo explicamos en un “plis”.

There are two ways of saying the date in English

British English

It’s written: day + month
E.g. 22nd November

But you say:
the twenty second of November

American English

It’s written: month + day
E.g. November, 22

But you say:
November the twenty second

Be careful with the day/month or month/day because in some cases it makes a big difference:

E.g.
American English 4/6/17 (month/day/year) > May 6, 2017
British English 6/4/17 (day/month/year) > 4th June 2017 Big difference!

Other things to keep in mind:

Days: we always use ordinal numbers for the spoken date in English (in British English you also write it but in American English you don’t)

1st-first
2nd-second
3rd-third
4th-fourth
5th-fifth
6th-sixth
7th-seventh
8th-eighth
9th-ninth
10th-tenth
etc…

Months: you always write months with a capital letter at the start

December-right
december-wrong 

Years: when you speak about years, they are usually divided into two parts

2017 twenty-seventeen
1978 nineteen-seventy eight

*Except for: years between 2001-2010

E.g. 2005 – we say two thousand and five