Imperfect German

The imperfect tense

Perfect tense recap

Remember, for the perfect tense you need:

• subject

• auxiliary (haben/sein)

• past participle

The imperfect tense

The imperfect is mostly used in written German, especially if you're reading/writing a story.

It is used to show repeated action in the past, e.g. I used to play the piano / I lived in France for 6 months.

How to form

Regular verbs

1. Take the steam of the verb (i.e. remove the -en from the infinitive)

2. Add the correct imperfect ending

Important verbs

Haben, sein and modal verbs are exclusively used in the imperfect tense.

Make sure you add at least 1 of each of these in every long writing!!

Modal verbs?

können - to be able to - konn- (e.g. ich konnte)

müssen - to have to - muss- (e.g. ich musste)

dürfen - to be allowed to - durf- (e.g. ich durfte)

wollen - to want to - woll- (e.g. ich wollte)

sollen - to ought to - soll- (e.g. ich sollte)

mögen - to like - ich moch- (e.g. ich mochte)

ich hatte

du hattest

er/sie/es hatte

wir hatten

ihr hattet

Sie/sie hatten

ich war

du warst

er/sie/es war

wir waren

ihr wart

Sie/sie waren

Haben and sein

Here are the stems and irregular endings.

I'm afraid you just have to learn these!

Other common irregulars

Other common irregulars

​<-- Here are the stems (you've just got to learn them!)

These are the endings to add to the stem -->