Imperfect Past VS Perfect Past in European Portuguese – When to use one or the other?

Knowing when to use the Perfect Past (Pretérito Perfeito Simples) and the Imperfect Past (Pretérito Imperfeito) in European Portuguese is one of the trickiest things for those learning the language. Hope this helps!

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21 Comments

  1. You have grown enormously as a teacher since your early days. The difference is night and day. The section on Imperfect Past vs Perfect Past is clear, organized and extremely useful for anyone learning Portuguese. Thank you, for this information.

  2. Das coisas mais difíceis de ensinar no português…. O problema é a zona cinzenta em que ambos os tempos se encontram e tanto podia ser um como o outro.

    1. 4:56 Talvez haja uma formula ou um truco que ajude a esclarecer esta nuance da língua portuguesa.
      No ano passado ía ( costumava ir) ao cinema todas as semanas, mas agora já não. Agora tenho outros gostos.
      Esse” mas agora já não” talvez possa ajudar a diferenciar entre o pretérito perfeito e imperfeito.
      Eu não sou professor, porém interpretaria a distinção dessas duas frases dessa maneira/forma.

  3. Hi Carla, Great video!!!

    ‘The Journey’ looks like an interesting programme, I may be being very silly but I can’t seem to see its pricing anywhere on the website. Could you possibly give me an indication of roughly how much it costs?

    Thank you.

    1. Olá e obrigada 😊 You can see the prices on this page: journey.portuguesewithcarla.com/start 👍🏽

  4. I’d just like to say our use of the imperfect in places where the conditional should actually be used is a mistake, a common, widely accepted one, that’s for certain. But I do try to use the conditional instead (even though I’m aware that the language is smashed and slashed, namely on TV, and then on to everyone else, on a daily basis, by gross mistakes that would make our sort of incorrect use of the imperfect past blush). For instance: “Gostaria de ganhar o euromilhões” instead of “Gostava de ganhar o euromilhões”. Many people would jokingly reply “Gostavas? Já não gostas?” to the latter.

    1. 😊 You’re very welcome – glad it helped you make more sense of these 2 pasts – it can be a really tricky aspect of the Portuguese language.

  5. hey carla, just here to say that I love your content, it helps me study and actually learn the grammar of the Portuguese 🙂 thank you very much for this opportunity :))

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