The difference between the imparfait and passé composé

There are a few different ways to talk about the past in French.

The two most common tenses used when describing something that happened in the past are the imparfait and passé composé.

We use the passé composé to talk about specific actions in the past that have been completed.

Example:

Hier, j’ai acheté un nouveau manteau. - Yesterday, I bought a new coat.

We use the imparfait, on the other hand, when we’re talking about a few different scenarios:

An ongoing action

Les enfants s’amusaient dans la cour. - The children were playing in the courtyard.

A habitual or repeated action

Mon père jouait au football tous les dimanches. - My dad used to play football every Sunday.

A physical or emotional description

Elle avait les yeux bleus et portait une écharpe. - She had blue eyes and wore a scarf.

The passé composé is formed by combining an auxiliary verb (either avoir or être) in the present tense and the past participle of the conjugated verb.

We use the auxiliary verb avoir for most verbs in the passé composé, while être is mostly used for reflexive verbs, movement verbs or verbs denoting a change of state.

Examples:

Nous avons couru pour arriver à l’heure. - We ran to arrive on time.

Je me suis brossé les dents trois fois aujourd’hui. - I brushed my teeth three times today.

Nous sommes allés au marché hier. - We went to the market yesterday.

Il est devenu père le mois dernier. - He became a father last month.

Below you can see how manger, a 1st group verb, conjugates in the passé composé.

Below you can see how entrer, also a 1st group verb, conjugates. Notice this verb takes the auxiliary verb être in the passé composé, because it is a movement verb. Note that with the auxiliary être, the past participle must agree in gender and number with the subject.

To see how 2nd and 3rd group verbs conjugate in the passé composé, check out Lesson 15 of the Complete French Course.

Below you can see how manger, a 1st group verb, conjugates in the imparfait.

There are subtle differences in the ways that 1st, 2nd and 3rd group verbs conjugate in the imparfait. To see how these different verb groups conjugate, check out the Verbs section of our website, or check out Lesson 23 of the Complete French Course.

In French, it is common to use both the passé composé and the imparfait together in the same sentence. This is typically the case when you want to describe something that happened (passé composé) while something else was happening (imparfait):

Alors que je rentrais chez moi en voiture, il a commencé à pleuvoir. - While I was driving home, it started to rain.

Elle n’avait pas l’air en forme quand je l’ai vue l’autre jour. - She wasn't looking very well when I saw her the other day.