Mistakes Even Native Speakers Make

Mistakes even native Italians make

Even fluent native speakers fall into linguistic traps. Recognizing these errors will elevate your Italian beyond what many Italians themselves achieve.

"Piuttosto che" used as "or"

One of the most widespread errors in modern Italian is using piuttosto che to mean "or" (oppure). In correct Italian, it means "rather than" and implies a preference: Preferisco il tè piuttosto che il caffè. Saying "Possiamo andare al cinema piuttosto che a teatro" to mean "cinema or theatre" is grammatically wrong, though extremely common in spoken Northern Italian.

"Qual è" — never with an apostrophe

Qual è is NOT an elision — it is a truncation. The word quale naturally shortens to qual before a vowel. Therefore, writing qual'è with an apostrophe is always incorrect. This is arguably the most common spelling mistake in Italian.

"Se io fossi" not "se io sarei"

The conditional hypothesis requires the subjunctive: Se io fossi ricco, viaggerei. Using the conditional in both clauses (Se io sarei ricco, viaggerei) is a serious grammatical error, though very common in informal speech.

"A me mi" — the forbidden double

While technically emphatic, a me mi piace is considered incorrect in standard Italian. The correct forms are a me piace (emphatic) or mi piace (neutral). However, some linguists now accept it in spoken registers.

"Gli" replacing "le" and "loro"

In standard Italian, gli means "to him" and le means "to her." Using gli for both genders or for the plural (gli ho detto instead of ho detto loro) is increasingly accepted in speech but remains incorrect in formal writing.