RESUMEN Los estudiantes de cursos universitarios de quimica general normalmente presentan inconvenientes para asimilar los conceptos fundamentales de la clasificacion de la materia. En este articulo se hizo un analisis de la base conceptual necesaria para entender tal clasificacion y se concluyo que estos cimientos no son solidos y muestran ambiguedades, razon por la cual el estudiante presenta dificultades al enfrentar este tema. Palabras claves: Cambio quimico, cambio fisico, cambio matematico, clasificacion de la materia. SUMMARY Students of universitary courses in general chemistry usually show inconvenients to assimilate fundamental concepts about matter classification. In this paper an analysis of conceptual base was done, which is indispensable to understand that classification. Hence, it was concluded that these foundations are not strong and they show ambiguities, it is the reason why the student shows difficulties when he studies this theme. Keywords: Chemical change, physical change, mathematical change, matter classification.