EN: recommend + V-ing / subjunctive / to-infinitive (2025)

Hi !

When will you use "Recommend + V" and "Recommend + ing"? Which form is the most correct?

Thanks a lot

Hello,

I believe both forms are correct.

Personally I would use:

- recommend somebody to do something

- recommend doing something

Still wait for the natives' input.

Bonjour,

Je lis deux phrases où se trouve le verbe 'to recommend' avec le verbe qui suit sans 'to' et l'autre phrase -ing?

I highly recommend you prepare well for this test.

I recommended going away for the weekend.

Dans quel cas met-on le verbe sans 'to' et/ou avec -ing?

Je vous remercie par avance de vos explications.

Chouquette.

Chouquette said:

I highly recommend [that] you prepare well for this test.
I recommended going away for the weekend.

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Dans la première phrase, l'équivalent français est je recommande que vous (+ subordonnée) alors que la seconde est je recommande de (+ infinitif). Peut-être est-ce l'ellipse du that qui t'as déstabilisée?

La première phrase est "I highly recommend

you prepare well for this test" mais le "that" est éliminé (ça se fait très souvent)

Quant à la deuxième phrase, "to recommend" est suivi par -ing quand il n'est pas séparé du participe (comme dans ton exemple), mais il est suivi par to+infinitif quand il est séparé du participe par un pronom par exemple (He recommended

to stay far)

Attends la réponse des natifs pour t'assurer plus!

Yes, they are very similar. One difference is that recommend (that) you prepare... is more specific and more direct. Could even be taken as an order.

With the gerund, it really is a recommendation or suggestion.

I don't know. The difference is subtle. Would like to see other anglophones' opinion.

dicomec said:

I recommended (his) going away for a few days.

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I learned that syntax at school – I mean recommend his going… – but I must admit I've never actually heard it and seldom read it. Is it just me or is it a phrase which isn't really used anymore? Or is it simply considered formal language and hence barely used in everyday speech?

You're saying it is spoken AE. Is it widespread?

Anyway, what about recommend to go away vs recommend going away?

Yup, this is a common one grammarians love to correct. Many AE speakers will say: I recommend him going away. And they will be corrected by purists to say: I recommend HIS going away.

I recommend just learning the correct form: HIS.

Maître, it is quite common. Also, we don't use recommend with TO + Infinitive. So, recommend to go away is not correct

Sorry to derail the thread, but let's put it this way: some things like this will sound wrong, not just stilted, despite (again) what formal grammar dictates. It's not always possible to reconcile prescriptivist standards with the actual spoken word.
As a native speaker, I do not recommend using a possessive pronoun in these situations 99% of the time, unless you're dealing in stately/formal affairs or writing a thesis, in which case a reformulation would probably be better anyway.

It's similar to the "than they/them" thing: grammar dictates "I'm better than they", but no American alive is going to say that on the spur of the moment, instead choosing "I'm better than them".

Which one you choose determines if you talk like a book or a person

Areyou_crazy: The subjunctive is falling out of favor in America. Though some contexts still have it without question ("I request that he be there"), the most common ones are losing it ("If I were" is steadily becoming "If I was")

Some of us might be stern old ladies.

In AE I do hear the possessive version also. Though, you are right in speech, the simple pronoun is quite common.

Maître Capello said:

I learned that syntax at school – I mean recommend his going… – but I must admit I've never actually heard it and seldom read it. Is it just me or is it a phrase which isn't really used anymore? Or is it simply considered formal language and hence barely used in everyday speech?

Click to expand...

It's perfectly good English and used fairly widely in BE. I try to use it exclusively (as opposed to "him going").

james_san said:

"I would recommend he went away for the weekend" also sounds good, although I can't explain why I would use went (past tense?) here.

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I suppose because 'would' is formally the preterit of 'will'.

I wouldn't use the past tense in that phrase, it sounds like a mistake to me.

I'd recommend he go away for the weekend.

I would say either "I recommend that you wash your car" or "I recommended washing your car".

Regardless of whether the infinitive is correct or not, it sounds awkward.

It seems this thread has missed the point that a clause of recommendation or command is one of the few places in English where the subjunctive mode is retained. The example uses 2nd person, which is not a good example because indicative and subjunctive are the same. One must use 3rd person singular because that is the only verb form that changes between indicative and subjunctive.

You would see this construction in an official proposal, perhaps as a list of recommendations before city council. The "that" is optional. I recommend (that): he spend $100,000 ; it take no more than a year ; she go to a higher level of government for funding. Indicative forms would be "spends", "takes" and "goes" but these would be incorrect since the subjunctive is required, and would sound wrong to most English speakers.

Hence the construction you are looking for, and the one recommended earlier in the trail without explanation, is:

I recommend (that)
you wash his/ he wash his / they wash his / we wash his
car.

By the way, "I recommend washing your car" sounds fine and is correct, however it is very hard to apply to anything other than 2nd person, where it is clear who is being addressed. If you say "I recommend washing his car", then it is not clear who you think should wash the car because the first pronoun in the subordinate clause is missing, i.e., implied. If you are not really recommending action on somebody's part, only observing that the car is dirty, it would be better to say "That car needs to be / should be washed.

I recommend
him washing his car / them washing his car / us washing his car

Would it also be correct then?