conjugation.preterite.regular
Regular preterite: hablé, comí, viví
-ar verbs take -é, -aste, -ó, -amos, -asteis, -aron; -er and -ir verbs share -í, -iste, -ió, -imos, -isteis, -ieron. The preterite reports completed past events.
conjugationA2standardinternally_reviewedv1.0.0
Explanation
The preterite (pretérito indefinido) is the tense of completed events: it says something happened, started, or finished at a specific point. Hablar: hablé, hablaste, habló, hablamos, hablasteis, hablaron. Comer and vivir share one set: comí, comiste, comió, comimos, comisteis, comieron.
Stress falls on the endings, which is why yo and él/ella carry written accents: hablé, habló, comí, comió. Forgetting them changes the word (hablo = I speak; habló = he spoke).
Note that -ar and -ir nosotros forms look identical to the present (hablamos, vivimos); context disambiguates. Unlike French, Spanish uses this tense constantly in speech — it is not literary.
Examples
I spoke with the owner yesterday.
Region: global
We ate at a local market.
Region: global
He lived five years in Asunción.
Region: global