French Grammar Lesson: The Imperfect Tense

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Here’s an important French grammar lesson! The French imperfect tense, or the imparfait, is used often in the French language. Study the imparfait today!

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English vs FrenchWhen and How to Use the Imperfect TenseHow to Form the Imperfect Tense in FrenchVerbs with Spelling ChangesThe Imperfect Tense for Irregular Verbs

In case you’re racking your brain trying to recall your lessons in imperfect tense in English, chances are, you won’t remember it. Why? Because the imperfect tense is mostly a feature of the Romance languages, such as French, Italian, Romanian, Spanish, and Portuguese.

English vs French

In English, we use the past progressive to denote continuous action while the simple past is used to express a previous state.

In French, the imperfect or imparfait is the verb tense used to talk about past events, especially as descriptions. This is why it is often called a “descriptive past tense” since it is commonly used in giving a description for something that happened.

Unlike the passé composé, which presents a past event as a completed whole, the imperfect describes a past action or state without focusing on its beginning or end. A time or duration can still be specified; that alone does not determine the tense.

The imperfect is called such based on the Latin word imperfectus which means ‘unfinished’.

Its English counterpart would be: was ____, was ____-ing or used to ____.

When and How to Use the Imperfect Tense

Here are the common uses of the imperfect tense:

1. To give a physical or emotional description of a past event.

Examples:

◦     She was depressed when her boyfriend left.

◦     It was raining so hard.

2. To talk about a past habitual occurrence or state of being.

  Examples:

◦     We used to run together every day.

◦     I used to like her a lot.

3. To indicate an action that was ongoing when something else took place.

Examples:

◦     I was looking at the photos when I remembered our old house.

◦     We were walking our dog when we saw the fire.

How to Form the Imperfect Tense in French

Do not translate English “was doing” by simply combining être with another verb. For most verbs, take the present-tense nous form, remove -ons, and add -ais, -ais, -ait, -ions, -iez, -aient. Être uses ét-.

The Imperfect Tense for -er Verbs

• For regular -er verbs such as donner, remove -ons from nous donnons to get donn-. This is also the infinitive without -er; spelling changes may apply.
• Add the correct ending to the stem.
• The ending would depend on the pronoun used in the sentence.

Let’s take for example the verb donner. Chop off the -er, and add the following endings based on the pronoun:

Important: je changes to j’ when used with verbs that begin with a vowel, most words that start with h, and the pronoun y. 

The French Imperfect Tense for -ir Verbs

• For regular -ir verbs of the finir type, nous finissons gives the stem finiss-. Add the standard imperfect endings. The table below combines -iss- with those endings for convenience.
• Add the correct ending to the stem.
• The ending is also dependent on the pronoun being used in the sentence.

As an example, let’s use the verb finir. Remove the -ir and add the appropriate endings.

The Imperfect Tense for -re Verbs

• For -re verbs of the attendre type, remove -ons from nous attendons to get attend-. This matches the infinitive without -re; other -re verbs may have different stems.
• Add the correct ending to the stem.
• The ending depends on the pronoun being used in the sentence.

We’ll use attendre as an example. Take out the -re and add the correct endings.

Verbs with Spelling Changes

Like in other tenses, verbs that have a -cer or -ger ending have slight changes in their spelling when conjugated to the Imperfect Tense. Take note of the 1,2,3,6 pattern in the changes. Meaning, the changes occur in the first, second, and third person singular, and in the third person plural.

Some examples:

1. lancer which means to throw – the c becomes ç when placed before a or o.

je lançais

tu lançais

il/elle/on lançait

nous lancions

vous lanciez

ils/elles lançaient

1. manger which means to eat –the letter g is changed to ge when placed before  a or o.

je mangeais

tu mangeais

il/elle/on mangeait

nous mangions

vous mangiez

ils/elles mangeaient

The Imperfect Tense for Irregular Verbs

Fortunately, there is only one irregular verb for the imperfect tense, and this is the verb être. More good news, it even follows the regular pattern (with the stem ét-), which makes our lives super simple this time.

j’étais

tu étais

il/elle/on était

nous étions

vous étiez

ils/elles étaient

Example: J’étais heureux. (I was happy)

See? Easy peasy.