Imperfect Tense

One of the two simple past tenses in Spanish is the IMPERFECT. The Imperfect Past tense is used to describe actions or situations that were incomplete or in progress at the point of time in the past that is being described. It is also used for ongoing conditions and repeated occurrences in the past.

The imperfect is the easiest, most regular tense in Spanish. You will notice below that -er and -ir verbs have the same endings (all with accents). The formation of the Imperfect for the regular verbs hablar (to speak) is shown in the table below.

    
Yo         hablaba      (I was speaking)    
                        (I used to speak) 

Tú         hablabas     (you were speaking)  
                        (you used to speak) 

Él         hablaba      (he was speaking)    
                        (he used to speak)  

Nosotros   hablábamos   (we were speaking)  
                        (we used to speak) 

Ellos      hablaban     (they were speaking) 
                        (they used to speak) 

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