An Overview of the Imperfect:

The imperfect is used to describe a past action that took place over a period of time. It describes a past "situation" rather than a past "event", for example, Cuando era pequeño, me encantaban los caballos. In some cases, it is used to describe something that repeatedly happened in the past, but no longer happens in the present, e.g.: El año pasado, yo hacía ejercicios cada mañana, pero este año estoy demasiado ocupado para hacerlos ("Last year I would exercise every morning, but this year I am too busy to do it").

The main kinds of sentences that use the imperfect are:

a) repeated action in the past, e.g.: De niño cantaba con mi madre en la iglesia ("When I was young, I used to sing with my mother in church")

b) interrupted action in the past, e.g.: Desayunaba cuando recibí la notica ("I was eating breakfast when I got the news")

c) description of a past situation or scene, e.g.: El cielo era azúl y los pájaros cantaban ("The sky was blue and the birds were singing").

d) to tell the time and ages in the past, e.g.: Eran las siete de la noche cuando empezó la fiesta de Julia, quién tenía 18 años ("It was 7 o'clock at night when party started for Julia, who was 18 years old").

How to Form the Imperfect

The imperfect is formed by attaching an ending to the stem of the verb. The ending used depends on the subject and on the ending of the infinitive form of the verb. This is illustrated in the following tables:

Verbs ending in -ar (e.g.: hablar)

-note that the nosotros form is the only one to have an accent

Verbs ending in -ir and -er (e.g.: hacer or vender)

-note that all the -ir/-er endings have an accent and are quite different from the -ar endings

Irregular Imperfects

The two main irregular perfects are ser and ir, shown in the tables:

-note that the nosotros forms of both regular and irregular verbs have accents