French has two everyday past tenses. The passé composé reports a single completed event ("I ate"). The imperfect (l'imparfait) paints the background — what was going on, what used to happen, what things were like. This lesson builds the imperfect, then teaches you to choose between the two.
The grammar here is the same French you will meet in every context; the examples are voiced through Cambridge IGCSE’s five topic areas — everyday activities (home & school), personal & social life (family & free time), the world around us (town, travel & the environment), the world of work (jobs), and the international world (customs & global issues).
Work through each screen and answer the questions as you go — some ask you to recognise the right tense, some ask you to produce a form by typing. Collect ⭐ stars and press Start.
Where the passé composé reports a finished action, the imperfect describes how things were or what was ongoing. It usually matches English "was …-ing" or "used to":
Three jobs: the imperfect is for (1) descriptions in the past, (2) ongoing actions ("was …-ing"), and (3) repeated / habitual actions ("used to"). No single completed event — that is the other tense.
The imperfect is beautifully regular. Take the nous-form of the present, drop the -ons, and add the imperfect endings:
Why the nous-form? It carries any irregular stem the verb has — so finir keeps its -iss- and faire keeps fais-. Learn one rule and every verb behaves.
The endings are the same for every verb in French. Here is parler laid out in full:
| person | form |
|---|---|
| je | parlais |
| tu | parlais |
| il / elle / on | parlait |
| nous | parlions |
| vous | parliez |
| ils / elles | parlaient |
Ear-trap: parlais, parlais, parlait and parlaient all sound the same. Only nous (-ions) and vous (-iez) are clearly different. The endings never change from verb to verb — only the stem does.
Every French verb forms its imperfect from the nous-stem — except être, which has its own stem ét-. The endings are still the normal ones:
| j'étais |
| tu étais |
| il était |
| nous étions |
| vous étiez |
| ils étaient |
Learn this cold: j'étais = "I was". It is one of the most useful verbs in the whole language — quand j'étais petit ("when I was little") opens countless GCSE answers.
The imperfect covers three big jobs, plus some very common fixed phrases:
Three you must know: il y avait = "there was / there were", c'était = "it was", and il faisait beau = "the weather was nice". These set phrases appear in almost every past-tense answer.
This is the heart of GCSE past tenses. Ask: is it one completed event, or the ongoing / habitual / descriptive setting?
A single completed event: "I ate", "she arrived", "it happened". J'ai mangé une pizza.
Ongoing, habitual or descriptive: "I was eating", "I used to eat", "it was sunny". Je mangeais.
Often together: the imperfect sets the scene, then the perfect interrupts it — Je regardais la télé quand il est arrivé. ("I was watching TV when he arrived.") Background = imperfect, event = perfect.
Which tense best fits each idea?
Tap an infinitive on the left, then tap its imperfect "I" form on the right.
A handful of imperfect phrases do the heavy lifting when you describe a past scene:
Notice: these are all the imperfect of everyday verbs — il y a → il y avait, c'est → c'était, il fait → il faisait. They set the background; a single dramatic event still takes the passé composé.
The two tenses work as a team. Set the scene in the imperfect, then drop in the event in the perfect:
Rule of thumb: the longer, "wallpaper" action is the imperfect; the sudden, one-off action that cuts in is the perfect. English "was …-ing … when …" is the classic signal.
Form the imperfect: nous-form of the present − -ons + -ais/-ais/-ait/-ions/-iez/-aient. parler → je parlais, faire → je faisais.
Only irregular stem: être → ét- → j'étais.
Uses of the imperfect: descriptions, ongoing "was …-ing", habitual "used to"; set phrases il y avait, c'était, il faisait beau.
Passé composé = one completed event ("I ate"); imparfait = background / ongoing / habit ("I was eating / used to eat").
Together: je regardais la télé quand il est arrivé — imperfect background, perfect event.
Next in the spine: the future and conditional. Press Finish to see your score.
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Next in the spine: Future & conditional — "will" and "would". Then lock this in with the Evaluate confidence quiz.