Lesson 21: Pretérito indefinido — the regular forms

Part 1: What pretérito indefinido is

Spanish has four past tenses. Don't panic — we learn them one at a time.

Pretérito indefinido (also called pretérito perfecto simple) is the simple past, the tense for completed actions with a defined start or end. It's the Spanish equivalent of English "I worked", "I ate", "I lived" — one finished event.

English	Spanish	Tense
I work every day.	Trabajo cada día.	present
I am working right now.	Estoy trabajando ahora.	present continuous (Lesson 20)
I worked yesterday. (and stopped)	Trabajé ayer.	indefinido ← this lesson
I used to work / was working all summer. (background)	Trabajaba todo el verano.	imperfecto (Lesson 23)

The big idea: indefinido = a dot on the timeline. The action started, finished, ended. There's usually a marker nearby: ayer, anoche, la semana pasada, en 2020, hace dos años.

Don't mix it up with the imperfecto (next-but-one lesson). Rule of thumb: indefinido = "and it was over" (one action, with edges). Imperfecto = "..." (it lasted, was a habit, was the background).

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Part 2: The three regular paradigms

Spanish verbs come in three flavors of infinitive: -ar, -er, -ir. Each gets its own set of indefinido endings. Drill this table until it's reflex — this is the foundation of Spanish narrative.

Person	-AR (hablar = "speak")	-ER (comer = "eat")	-IR (vivir = "live")
yo	hablé	comí	viví
tú	hablaste	comiste	viviste
él/ella/Ud.	habló	comió	vivió
nosotros	hablamos	comimos	vivimos
vosotros	hablasteis	comisteis	vivisteis
ellos/Uds.	hablaron	comieron	vivieron

Free gift: the -ER and -IR endings in indefinido are identical. One paradigm covers both. You only have two patterns to learn: -AR vs. -ER/IR.

Watch the tildes! hablé (I spoke) and habló (he/she/you-formal spoke) both have a written accent on the final vowel. Drop the accent and you get hablo (I speak — present), a completely different word. Same five letters, different verb. Spanish punishes typos here.

The chant (memorize this rhythm)

-AR:   é      aste     ó       amos     asteis     aron
-ER:   í      iste     ió      imos     isteis     ieron
-IR:   í      iste     ió      imos     isteis     ieron

Say it out loud three times. Then three more. Then three more. The chant is the goal.

Two booby traps to memorize:

1. hablé / habló — the tilde is mandatory. Forget it and you've written a different word.
2. hablamos / vivimos — identical to the present tense. Hoy hablamos = "today we're speaking"; Ayer hablamos = "yesterday we spoke". Context decides. (Only -ER doesn't have this collision: present comemos vs. preterite comimos.)

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Part 3: Spelling quirks in -AR verbs (yo form only)

In the yo form, verbs ending in -car, -gar, -zar swap a letter before the -é ending. This isn't an exception — it's Spanish trying to keep the sound unchanged when the next vowel changes.

Infinitive	yo	Why
buscar (to look for)	busqué	c → qu, to keep the "k" sound (otherwise c+e = "th"/"s")
llegar (to arrive)	llegué	g → gu, to keep the hard "g" (otherwise g+e = harsh "h")
empezar (to begin)	empecé	z → c, because Spanish doesn't write z before e/i
tocar (to touch, to play)	toqué	same as buscar
pagar (to pay)	pagué	same as llegar
almorzar (to have lunch)	almorcé	same as empezar

These swaps happen ONLY in the yo form! All the other persons stay regular: buscaste, buscó, buscamos, buscasteis, buscaron. Same story for llegar and empezar.

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Part 4: Time markers — when the sentence screams "indefinido"

If you hear one of these markers, you almost always need indefinido. Train yourself to pair them with preterite forms automatically.

Spanish	English
ayer	yesterday
anoche	last night
anteayer	the day before yesterday
esta mañana	this morning (when it's no longer morning)
la semana pasada	last week
el mes pasado	last month
el año pasado	last year
el lunes pasado	last Monday
hace dos años	two years ago
hace una hora	an hour ago
en 2020	in 2020
en marzo	in March (of a finished year)
aquella vez	that time
aquel día	that day
de repente	suddenly
entonces	then, at that point

A subtle one: esta mañana (this morning) only triggers indefinido once the morning is over. Esta mañana comí huevos — it's lunchtime now, the morning's done, indefinido fits. If you're still in the morning, you'd more naturally reach for pretérito perfecto compuesto (Lesson 25). This is mostly true in Spain; Latin America tends to use indefinido for both.

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Part 7: Indefinido vs. present — train your ear

Many preterite forms differ from the present only by a tilde or a single ending. Listen carefully.

Present	Indefinido	The difference
hablo (I speak)	habló (he spoke)	tilde on ó + different person
como (I eat)	comió (he ate)	totally different form
vivo (I live)	vivió (he lived)	totally different form
hablas	hablaste	-as vs. -aste
comes	comiste	-es vs. -iste
hablamos	hablamos	identical — context decides!
vivimos	vivimos	identical — context decides!

English-speaker hack: treat the tilde on ó / é like the difference between content (noun) and content (adjective) in English — same spelling minus one mark, totally different word. The accent IS the meaning.

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