The pretérito (preterite) tense is used in Spanish to talk about actions that were completed in the past. It’s one of the two used in Spanish to talk about the past.
The pretérito (preterite) tense is one of the tenses used in Spanish to talk about the past. We use the preterite to talk about actions that were completed in the past.
The other Spanish tense that we use to describe the past is the imperfect. Learn about the imperfect tense with this article.
Conjugating verbs in the preterite tense is simple! Just take the infinitive ending (- ar , - er , or - ir ) off the verb and add one of the following endings. Don’t forget the tildes (accents)!
Subject | -ar Verbs | -er and -ir Verbs |
---|---|---|
yo | -é | -í |
tú | -aste | -iste |
vos | -aste | -iste |
él, ella, usted | -ó | -ió |
nosotros | -amos | -imos |
vosotros | -asteis | -isteis |
ellos, ellas, ustedes | -aron | -ieron |
Let’s take a look at some examples of regular verbs in the preterite tense: