How to form and use the past perfect in German?

The past perfect, called Plusquamperfekt in German, is used to refer to past events that happened before another past event. It is a combination of the past tense of the auxiliary verbs haben or sein and the past participle of the main verb. Here is an example:

You can see in the example above that Anne’s dear husband had prepared the dinner before she came home. Both actions happened in the past, but one happened earlier than the other. Let’s find out how this is done in German!

In German, we use the past perfect to show that something happened before another past moment — to talk about a time that is “even more in the past than the past tense.”

The German term for this tense, Plus-quam-perfekt, is actually Latin and literally means “more than completed.” Here, “completed” refers to the past tense, which we use for completed actions. Let’s see an example:

We can visualize this situation in a timeline:

Because the Plus-quam-perfekt makes clear which of the two events happened first, we can put the two verbs in any order:

Just like English, German has several ways of discussing actions in the past. There’s the Präteritum (meaning simple past) and also the Perfekt (meaning perfect tense). In colloquial German, you may hear the Perfekt used with the Plusquamperfekt quite often.

So far, the past perfect in German sounds pretty similar to the English past perfect (“had verbed”) form. But, as usual, German has a catch with the past perfect that makes it so special: You do not always use a form of haben (meaning to have), like in English, but sometimes the auxiliary verb sein (meaning to be) instead.

Let’s have a closer look at how to form this tense!

If you’ve already mastered the German perfect tense, then forming the past perfect is really quite simple. The recipe goes like this:

1. Take the perfect tense of a verb:

   Ich habe gespielt.

   Translation: I have played.

   Ich bin gelaufen.

   Translation: I have walked.

2. Put the auxiliary verb, haben or sein, into the past tense:

   Ich hatte gespielt.

   Translation: I had played.

   Ich war gelaufen.

   Translation: I had walked.

It’s super simple, right?

If you haven’t mastered the perfect tense yet, no worries, here are some instructions for forming the past perfect from scratch:

1. Start with the dictionary form of the word you want to put into the past perfect:

   spielen

   Translation: to play

   laufen

   Translation: to run

2. Form the past participle by adding ge…t (for regular verbs) or ge…en (for irregular verbs) to the base form:

   gespielt

   Translation: played

   gelaufen

   Translation: ran

   This is a general rule on participles, but you can learn more from our post on German past participles.

3. Add the past tense auxiliary verb. For verbs referring to changing places or states, use sein; for other verbs, use haben The past tense stem for sein is war-, and the past tense stem for haben is hatt-.

   Ich hatte gespielt.

   Translation: I had played.

   Ich war gelaufen.

   Translation: I had walked.

Much like in the perfect tense, in the past perfect you can…

• Form questions by bringing haben/sein to the front, followed by the subject:

  Hattest du gespielt?

  Translation: Had you played?

• Form a negative sentence with nicht (meaning not):

  Ich hatte nicht gespielt.

  Translation: I had not played.

  Hattest du nicht gespielt?

  Translation: Had you not played?

While the past perfect in English is strictly used only when referring to the past of the past, Germans tend to overuse it sometimes, even when there is no reference to another past event. This usage is rather colloquial. Take a look at the examples below:

• Ich war noch nie da gewesen.

  Translation: I had/have never been there.
• Das Auto hatte vorhin schon hier geparkt.

  Translation: That car was parked here earlier.
• Gestern hatten wir Oma besucht, weil sie uns eingeladen hatte.

  Translation: Yesterday, we visited our grandma because she had invited us.

So, what have we covered today? Let’s review!

• The Plusquamperfekt (or past perfect) is the past of the past and it is used to refer to past events that happened before another past event.

• The past perfect is a combination of the past tense of the auxiliary verbs haben or sein and the past participle of the main verb.

• The auxiliary verb haben is used in most cases, but sein is used with verbs referring to change of place or change of state.

• Notable exceptions to the rule are the verbs sein and bleiben.

Feeling confident with the past perfect in German? Try it out with our German past perfect exercises! Happy learning!