The Past Simple Tense
Talk about finished actions and events at a definite time in the past — with regular -ed endings, irregular verbs to learn, and did / didn’t for negatives and questions.
Press a button. Watch the verb change.
Everything here is in the past simple. Switch between a regular and an irregular verb, flip the form, and watch how the verb behaves — and where did / didn’t takes over.
Got the pattern? Jump to the practice →
The rules — with examples
How to build each form, when you use the past simple, and the words that signal it.
The three forms
subject + past form (irregular)
She went. (irregular)
She didn’t go.
Did she go? — No, she didn’t.
Watch out: after did / didn’t the verb is always the base form — “Did she go?”, never “Did she went?”.
When to use it
Regular verbs: -ed spelling
Signal words & a tip
Two more spellings: a verb ending in -e just adds -d (live → lived); and a verb ending in a vowel + -y just adds -ed (play → played, not “plaied”).
Practice & score yourself
Ten quick questions with instant scoring and a short explanation for every answer — especially the ones you get wrong.
The one rule to remember
Use the past simple for finished actions at a definite time in the past. Regular verbs add -ed; irregular verbs have their own forms to learn. But in negatives and questions every verb goes back to its base after did / didn’t: “Did she go?”, never “Did she went?”.