Simple Past Tense - Definition, Rules, How to Use It, With Examples

Simple Past Tense is the ‘simplest’ or the ‘basic’ form of the past tense. Thus, the definition for simple past tense basically describes an event or action that happened in the past and is no longer happening. Thus, actions denoting actions that happened in the past and are over or finished now categorized as simple past tense.

So, whenever you come across expressions like – I ate a burger yesterday. Or We spoke to our manager about a deadline extension. Or something that happened over a couple of years ago all suggest past actions which are denoted by simple past tense.  

Here most of the base verb forms are prefixed with either ‘d’ or ‘ed’, but there are exceptions too in this rule of simple past tense.  

Simple Past Tense Examples 

Examples for simple past tense will help applicants understand the use of the past form of the verb. Here are 10 examples of simple past tense: 

1. I graduated in 2015 from Harvard University. 
2. Neha cooked us a sumptuous dinner last night. 
3. We went for a movie last weekend. 
4. She spoke about the rising inflation rates in the country in the previous meeting. 
5. We gathered for a party at Sam’s house last Sunday. 
6. Risha hoisted the flag on her terrace on 26 January. 
7. He swam two lengths at a stretch in the Olympic-sized pool. 
8. 10 years back we lived in the outskirts of Delhi. 
9. My batchmates participated in the Model UN in college.  
10. I first attended a concert 12 years back in the USA. 

Simple past tense examples will aid in IELTS preparation, especially for the IELTS Speaking and IELTS Writing sections. Applicants would understand the use of this grammar topic and will be able to use the concepts in their writing and speaking modules. 

The use of simple past tense is spread across instances, events and actions that occurred in the past. Here is the use of simple past tense with examples below: 

1. Actions Happened in the Past

The actions that have been completed or that happened in the past. For example: 

• I finished my homework three days ago. 
• We made our presentation yesterday night. 
• He baked us a delicious cake on his last birthday. 

2. Past Habits

A lot of people used to have a habit and would do something that they don’t do now, these are past habits, where simple past tense is used. Here are some simple past tense examples for understanding: 

• Reha ate mud when she was a toddler. 

• I played with my dad when he came back from the office. 
• She spoke with a lisp when she was in class IV. 

3. Sharing Old Stories

Remember when grandparents used to tell us stories and they would always begin with a typical past tense phrase like ‘once upon a time’, ‘100 years back there was a king’ and many others use the simple past tense form of the narrative. Simple past tense examples for old stories are: 

• Once upon a time, there was a mighty king. He fought with 10 blindfolded bulls. 

• There was a time when we read books about history. 
• 1000 years back people lived on fruits.  

4. Reported Speech

Even while using reported speech where someone is describing a past incident the indirect speech uses the simple past tense. Here are a few simple past examples for reported speech: 

• Direct Speech: Reema said, “I went to a spa yesterday.” 
• Indirect Speech: Reema said she went to a spa the day before. 
• Direct Speech: Raj said. “I spoke about the concerns in the meeting today.” 
• Indirect Speech: Raj said he spoke about the concerns in the meeting that day.  

After understanding the use of simple past tense and simple past tense examples let us now understand the simple past rules based on different sentence types. 

The simple past tense rules include a subject with the past form of the verb followed by an object. Here is how simple past tense rule varies for different sentence forms: 

*S denotes subject, V denotes verb and O denotes object.  

Note: It is interesting to note that the simple past tense rules do not change with the plural forms of the verb. This means, that the subject may be plural, but the simple past tense verb form will remain the same for singular and plural contexts. Some simple past tense examples for plural connotations are as follows: 

• We ate breakfast late today. 

• We didn’t eat breakfast today. 

• Did you all/guys eat breakfast today? 

Based on the above-mentioned simple past tense examples for plural subjects, it can be noted that the verb forms do not change and remain the same irrespective of a singular or plural context. However, with the negative and interrogative sentences, the basic form of the verb is used because the verb form of 'do' is used.

Based on the first, second and third person check out how simple past tense varies for the verb eat and hear in the table below: 

Thus, these examples for simple past tense include one example of regular and one example of irregular verbs. The only aim of giving past simple tense examples was to show that the verb forms do not change based on first, second or third person, unlike present tense.

Do you often get confused about how the verb form changes based on simple past tense? Understand that the verb forms in the simple past tense change if they are regular or irregular verbs.  

The regular verbs just add ‘ed’ or ‘d’ at the end of the base form of the verb. However, irregular verbs spellings change in simple past tense and DO NOT end in ‘ed’ or ‘d’ when referring to a past event.  

Top 10 Regular & Irregular Verbs in Simple Past Tense 

To understand the difference between regular and irregular verb forms in the simple past tense, here is a comparative table: 

Thus, if you notice there is a pattern of change in all these verb forms. Verbs ending in ‘-er’ are suffixed with ‘ed’ in simple past tense. Verbs with ‘-ing’ change to ‘-ang’ and verbs ending in ‘ry’ change to ‘ied’ in simple past tense references.  

Apart from these verbs - regular and irregular, there are also verb forms that do not change in the use of simple past tense like:  

• put - put 

• cut - cut  

• shut - shut  

• read - read  

• spread - spread  

• set - set 

Thus, past simple tense sentences will not change if these verbs are in the sentence. 

Now that you have understood the core elements of using a simple past tense and read about some examples for simple past tense, let us check out how simple past tense varies with past perfect and past continuous tense.

Simple past tense is the fundamental use of an action in the past tense but is often confused with past continuous and past perfect verb forms. For a better understanding here is the difference between simple past, past perfect and past continuous to avoid confusion and understand the concepts closely:

Prospective IELTS applicants can keep this table handy while preparing for the exam, especially for its different modules.

There are some common mistakes to avoid while using the simple past past tense. Here are some of them that must be avoided at all costs: 

1. Confusing Simple Past with Simple Present Tense

Simple past tense means an action has happened while simple present tense means universal truths and information. Thus, unknowingly applicants use a verb form that describes an action happening now (present tense) when they should be talking about an action that had already happened in the past (past tense); For example: 

• Incorrect: I bring a new phone yesterday. 
• Correct: I bought a new phone yesterday. 

2. Use of Right Verb Forms in Simple Past Tense

Applicants often confuse the regular and irregular verb forms and how they are used in a context. While regular verbs just add ‘ed’ or ‘d’ in the end, irregular verbs will change. Let us understand through an example: 

Regular Verb Form Example for Simple Past

• Incorrect: I play badminton at the club this weekend. 

• Correct: I played badminton at the club this weekend. 

Irregular Verb Form Example for Simple Past 

• Incorrect: I leave the office by 6:30 p.m. last week. 

• Correct: I left the office by 6:30 p.m. last week.  

3. Simple Past vs Past Perfect Tense

Past perfect tense refers to an action that occurred before another time. Past perfect tense use is also seen in cases where a past action occurred before a given time.  While simple past is an action that simply happened in the past. Example, 

• Incorrect: I had signed my new apartment lease yesterday. 
• Correct: I signed my new apartment lease last week. 

4. Simple Past vs Past Continuous

As the name suggests, past simple actions got over in the past, the past continuous actions are temporary actions that were going on in the background in the past at some point of time. So how to differentiate between the two? Let’s find out:  

• Incorrect: I played football when it was raining.  

• Correct: I was playing football when it started raining.