Mastering Past Tense in Spanish: 5 Tenses You Need to Learn

Learning past tense in Spanish can be a difficult concept to grasp, but we've made this simple video to guide you to understanding the 5 past tenses in no time. Let's go!

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🏫 MORE SPANISH LESSONS

Present Progressive: Spanish Lesson #10

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📓 EXTRA RESOURCES

Past Tense Spanish: The Only Beginner Guide You Need

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⏱ TIMESTAMPS
00:00 - Intro
01:20 - Simple Past
02:18 - Imperfect Past Tense
05:23 - Past Progressive
08:06 - Present Perfect
09:18 - Past Perfect

[girl_whsings]

legitmately the most helpful video on the internet i have 3 dyas to learn all 5 in spoken and written god help me

[MariaJinestaRodriguez]

You are awesome. I am Spanish high school teacher and use all your videos for my classes. This website is the best.

[JasonH-nuwd]

And they say English is hard to learn. Siiiigh. 5 different past tenses!?! I'll get it done, thanks to help from sources like these, but Not easy.

[apejoves]

01:24 Just in a cool way: "in spanish is called pretérito o..."
PD: Most spanish speakers use naturally all these tenses but do not know conscioustly the names or the diferences. It happens with natives speakers of any language.

[Sal-rwlc]

Another great video from Baselang, I am so happy I started learning Spanish with you! Sammy, Level 3 student.

[sanz]

Incredible! You laid them out so clearly!

[sunlight]

Awesome video, I finally found a video that explains these verbs clearly. Thank you!

[MeenuRana-vd]

Su método de enseñanza es excelente. ❤

[lifeishealinghealthwellnes]

The best lesson I had all year in Spanish. I so happy that my confusion about how to use past tenses was finally resolved today. You were right when you said in the beginning of this lesson, that I would understand how to use and recognize the 5 past tenses without tears. Thanks so much.😀

[floresamor]

Can you do a video comparing past perfect and present perfect?

[allanandfionafullerton]

Es de verdad un video genial, sobre todo el pretérito imperfecto 👍

[annadeptua]

Great video, very helpful. Thanks a lot.

[quespanish]

Spanish teacher here. Asking to other Spanish teachers: in which countries do they use the word preterite? Never heard it. I like the video explanations, though.

[ChemWizKid]

I'm a little confused because she says Imperfect past doesn't have an English equivalent but wouldn't it just be "Subject + used to + verb"? Because, for example, "I played basketball 5 years ago" is distinctly different from "I used to play basketball, but haven't for 5 years". The first case implies a specific time that basketball was played whereas the second sentence implies that the activity was ongoing. So isn't that pretty much exactly the same as it works in Spanish?

[dreamysol]

This video was so helpful, I feel like I understand the past tense much better!

[Baselang]

Hope you enjoyed the lesson! Is there anything you find to be difficult when learning past tense in Spanish?

[prishasharma]

then what's the difference between ¿preterite e preterito?

[alypolyglot]

spanish is easy for me to speak but difficult when i try to make a sentences, jajaja

[Mafiaboss]

😂 English is so much easier to learn. Then again, it's language learning. We just have to adapt it. Great video.

[spaniardxxxiii]

I'm Mexican, and I still can't speak Spanish. Verb conjugation is worse than Chinese tones. You could get a black belt in BJJ before you could be fluent in Spanish.