The present conditional
You have been using this tense since week 15 without being told: je voudrais, j'aimerais, pourriez-vous, ce serait. Here is the system behind those four phrases.
Formation: the future stem plus the imperfect endings. Both halves are already known, and nothing new has to be memorised.
| stem | the futur simple stem (week 19) — always ends in -r |
|---|---|
| endings | the imparfait endings (week 16) — -ais, -ais, -ait, -ions, -iez, -aient |
| infinitif | futur | conditionnel |
|---|---|---|
| parler | je parlerai | je parlerais |
| être | je serai | je serais |
| avoir | j'aurai | j'aurais |
| aller | j'irai | j'irais |
| pouvoir | je pourrai | je pourrais |
| vouloir | je voudrai | je voudrais |
The ten irregular stems of week 19 are the same ten here. Learn the future and you have the conditional for free.
What it does — three jobs:
| politeness | Je voudrais un café. · Pourriez-vous m'aider ? |
|---|---|
| a hypothesis | À ta place, je partirais. |
| an unconfirmed report | Il y aurait cinquante personnes. (reportedly) |
The first is by far the most frequent, and it is why je voudrais replaced je veux back in week 15.
The spelling trap, and it matters. Je serai (future) and je serais (conditional) sound almost identical and differ by one letter. The rule is the meaning: -ai is what will happen, -ais is what would. In an exam this is a written-accuracy point, and it is the commonest place to lose one.
What this unlocks
Knowing the rule is not the same as producing it.
This page explains the pattern. The track drills it: the point arrives inside a mini-dialogue, then production marked against a CEFR descriptor, then a module test that returns you to your two weakest sessions if you miss it.