ITALIAN DIRECT OBJECT PRONOUNS

PERSON
SINGULAR
PLURAL

I
mi (me)
ci (us)

II
ti (you, informal)
vi (you, informal)

III
lo, la (him, her, it)
li, le (them, masculine/feminine)


La (you, formal)
Li, Le (you, formal, masculine/feminine)


In Italian, a direct object pronoun is placed immediately before a conjugated verb:

Se vediamo i ragazzi, li invitiamo. (If we see the boys, we’ll invite them.)

Compra la frutta e la mangia. (He buys the fruit and eats it.)

The only exception to that is when a sentence contains an infinitive. In this case, the object pronoun is attached to the end of it (note that the final -e of the infinitive is dropped):

? importante mangiarla ogni giorno. (It is important to eat it every day.)

? una buon’idea invitarli. (It’s a good idea to invite them.)

In a negative sentence, the word non must come before the object pronoun:

Non la mangiano. (They don’t eat it.)