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The irregular imperfect verbs are used to describe a particular event in the past, which no longer has a link to the present. They are mainly used to write reports, articles or novels.

The imperfect tense is different to the perfect tense because it tends to be used to describe one particular event in the past, rather than things that have happened in the past in general. For example, you may want to describe a particular concert you went to or a holiday you had.

For this reason, it’s the tense that people use when they are writing online reports, newspaper articles or novels. They are not describing things they have typically done – normally they want to tell you about one particular event or story.

Here is an example, which states:

“Yesterday, the German national football team won their first game of the World Cup…”

Forming the Imperfect Tense

The imperfect tense is not hard as long as you learn the correct forms of the verb.

What’s good about the imperfect tense is that you only use one verb, as there is no auxiliary verb like in the perfect tense.

As long as you remember that the imperfect tense form needs to go in second place, there is nothing hard about the word order.

In fact, it is exactly like the simple past in English:

Ich machte meine Hausaufgaben. – I did my homework.

Irregular Stems and Endings

Irregular verbs work in quite similar way to regular verbs.

However, if the verb is irregular, you have to use the irregular verb stem then add slightly different endings.

The irregular imperfect verb stems can be seen in a dictionary or on an irregular verb list.

For instance, if you check the verb trinken (to drink), you will find that it is an irregular verb and that the irregular imperfect stem is trank. Then you need to add the imperfect endings to the imperfect stem.

If you examine the following table, you can see that the first and third person singular forms – ‘I’ and ‘he/she/it’ – don’t need an ending added to the stem at all.

Pronoun	ich
Stem	trank-
Ending	–
Full forms	ich trank – I drank

Pronoun	du
Stem	trank-
Ending	-st
Full forms	du trankst – you drank

Pronoun	er/sie/es
Stem	trank-
Ending	–
Full forms	er/sie/es trank – he/she/it drank

Pronoun	wir
Stem	trank-
Ending	-en
Full forms	wir tranken – we drank

Pronoun	ihr
Stem	trank-
Ending	-t
Full forms	ihr trankt – you drank

Pronoun	Sie
Stem	trank-
Ending	-en
Full forms	Sie tranken – you drank

Pronoun	sie
Stem	trank-
Ending	-en
Full forms	sie tranken – they drank

These are some examples of irregular verbs in the first person singular:

Infinitive	fahren
Imperfect	ich fuhr
English	I went/travelled

Infinitive	gehen
Imperfect	ich ging
English	I went

Infinitive	lesen
Imperfect	ich las
English	I read

Infinitive	sehen
Imperfect	ich sah
English	I saw/watched

Infinitive	trinken
Imperfect	ich trank
English	I drank

Infinitive	essen
Imperfect	ich aß
English	I ate

Infinitive	schwimmen
Imperfect	ich schwamm
English	I swam

Some common irregular German verbs in the imperfect tense include:

Infinitive	gehen (to go)
Stem	ging-
Example	Ich ging ins Konzert.
Meaning	I went to the concert.

Infinitive	fahren (to travel)
Stem	fuhr-
Example	Wir fuhren nach Österreich.
Meaning	We travelled to Austria.

Infinitive	essen (to eat)
Stem	aß-
Example	Er aß zu viele Pommes.
Meaning	He ate too many chips.

Infinitive	trinken (to drink)
Stem	trank-
Example	Sie trank viel Sprudelwasser.
Meaning	She drank a lot of sparkling water.

Infinitive	fliegen (to fly)
Stem	flog-
Example	Wir flogen zusammen nach Berlin.
Meaning	We flew (together) to Berlin.

Infinitive	lesen (to read)
Stem	las-
Example	Ich las in meinem Schlafzimmer.
Meaning	I read in my bedroom.

Infinitive	schreiben (to write)
Stem	schrieb-
Example	Wir schrieben eine E-Mail.
Meaning	We wrote an email.

Infinitive	finden (to find)
Stem	fand-
Example	Ich fand das unfair.
Meaning	I found that unfair.

Infinitive	denken (to think)
Stem	dachte-
Example	Ich dachte, dass das gut war.
Meaning	I thought that it was good.