Spanish B1 — Preterite vs Imperfect Drills flashcards
10 of 60 cards free to study here · 7 topics · the whole deck is built into Willys
Sixty prompts: regular, spelling-change, irregular and -ir stem-changing preterites, the imperfect and its three irregulars, then choice drills on background vs completed action, interruptions and the verbs that change meaning (conocer, saber, querer, poder).
Drills deck · part of Spanish A1–B2 · written against: CEFR levels A1–B2; neutral Latin-American Spanish with Spain variants noted. Updated 2026-10-10.
In the app every card is read aloud: the Japanese, Chinese, Korean, Spanish or other language side in its own native voice and the English side in yours, with a hands-free Listen mode for whole decks.
Study the free sample
10 cards from the deck as they are. Flip, rate yourself, filter by topic; your progress stays in this browser.
Tap the card or press Space to flip
The 10 sample cards as a list
-
hablar → yo, preteritehabléRegular preterite
Regular -ar preterite: drop -ar, add -é. The written accent matters: hablo (no accent) is the present, I speak.
Example: Ayer hablé dos horas por teléfono con mi hermana. — Yesterday I talked with my sister by phone for two hours. -
hablar → usted, preteritehablóRegular preterite
The third person singular of -ar verbs ends in a stressed -ó, one form for él, ella and usted.
Watch out: hablo = I speak (present); habló = he/she/you spoke. Only the accent and the stress tell them apart. -
buscar → yo, preteritebusquéSpelling changes
-car verbs change c → qu before -é to keep the hard k sound. Only the yo form changes: buscaste, buscó.
Watch out: Same for tocar → toqué, sacar → saqué, explicar → expliqué. -
llegar → yo, preteritelleguéSpelling changes
-gar verbs write g → gu before -é so the g stays hard. Only yo changes: llegaste, llegó.
Example: Llegué a casa de Lucía con un ramo de girasoles. — I arrived at Lucía's house with a bunch of sunflowers. -
ser → yo, preteritefuiIrregular preterite
Ser and ir share one preterite: fui, fuiste, fue, fuimos, fuisteis, fueron, with no written accents.
Example: Fui muy feliz mientras trabajé en aquella librería de viejo. — I was very happy while I worked at that secondhand bookstore. -
ir → ellos, preteritefueronIrregular preterite
Identical to the preterite of ser; context tells them apart, and a + a destination almost always means ir.
Example: Fueron al cine después de cenar. — They went to the movies after dinner. -
pedir → él, preteritepidióStem-changing -ir
-ir stem changers change e → i in the preterite only in the third person: pidió, pidieron. Compare pedí, pediste, pedimos.
Example: Pidió la cuenta al mesero. — He asked the waiter for the bill. -
hablar → yo, imperfecthablabaImperfect
-ar imperfect endings: -aba, -abas, -aba, -ábamos, -abais, -aban. Yo and él/ella/usted share the form, so add the subject when it is unclear.
Example: De niña hablaba con el perro del vecino a través de la valla. — As a girl I used to talk to the neighbor's dog through the fence. -
Cuando era niño, ___ (jugar, yo) a las escondidas entre los maizales todos los veranos. — preterite or imperfect, and why?jugaba — imperfect.Preterite vs imperfect
Why: A repeated, habitual action in the past (todos los veranos, cuando era niño) is imperfect; English would say used to play. -
What does conocer mean in the preterite vs the imperfect?Preterite conocí = I met (for the first time); imperfect conocía = I knew, was acquainted with.Meaning changes
Example: Conocí a Marta en 2020; ya conocía a su hermano. — I met Marta in 2020; I already knew her brother.
Unlock the whole deck
You are studying a free 10-card sample. All 60 cards of Spanish B1 — Preterite vs Imperfect Drills, the other 35 Spanish A1–B2 decks, and spaced-repetition scheduling are built into Willys. 14-day free trial, then $14.99 a year.
In Willys, tap Exam Library at the top of your Decks (or Browse Exam Library… under the + button), find the exam on its shelf or by search, tick it and tap Add.
More Spanish A1–B2 decks
← All Spanish A1–B2 decks, with the study guide and topic outline.
About these cards
Review status: Second-reader reviewed, with corrections applied.
Checked against:
- Checked against the Real Academia Española conjugation tables (dle.rae.es), the RAE/ASALE Nueva gramática de la lengua española (online edition) and its Manual, the Diccionario panhispánico de dudas (rae.es/dpd), the Ortografía de la lengua española (2010) and SpanishDict (reference only; no text copied). All example sentences are original.
These are independent study notes written for Willys. They are not official exam material, may contain mistakes, and are no substitute for your course, your teacher or the exam owner's own publications. Found an error? Tell us — corrections ship as a new version of the deck.
Use of these pages is covered by our Terms of Use.