Portuguese Past Tenses – Usage Rundown Anchored to English

In this article, we will take a look at the Portuguese equivalents of the English Past Simple, Past Continuous, and Past Perfect tenses.

Related Video Lessons

Here are a couple of analogous reads about the Present and Future tenses:
• Portuguese Present Tenses – Usage Rundown Anchored to English
• Portuguese Future Tenses – Usage Rundown Anchored to English

I will be using the verb dormir* (sleep) for all the examples below:

Past Simple

There are two past tenses* that often map onto the English past simple, namely the Preterite (Pretérito Perfeito) and the Imperfect (Pretérito Imperfeito).

This often confuses learners whose native tongue doesn’t have this tense nuance (English included). Let’s then try to wrap our heads around it.

* These are so-called “verb aspects” (there is only one past tense).

Preterite – Completed actions

We use the preterite to talk about past actions that are completed and well delimited in time: 

As you can see above, the Preterite (dormiu) translates to the Past Simple (slept) in English.

Note that we also use the Preterite in situations where, in English, we use the Present Perfect: