How to Conjugate Japanese Verb Past Form た

The plain past form refers to the た form of verbs. Verbs in this form end in 〜た or 〜だ, like 食べた (ate), 飲んだ (drank), and 来た (came).

What Is the Past Form?

The plain past form always ends in either 〜た or 〜だ. It is conjugated in exactly the same way as the て form, but with 〜た in the place of 〜て (or 〜だ instead of 〜で). So if you've already learned the て form, you now know the た form too. If not, let's take a look at how to put together the た form. Alternatively, if you want to know more about how this form is used, click here.

Godan	会う　→　会った立つ　→　立った代わる　→　代わった写す　→　写した書く　→　書いた泳ぐ　→　泳いだ死ぬ　→　死んだ学ぶ　→　学んだ休む　→　休んだ
Ichidan	食べる　→　食べた起きる　→　起きた閉じる　→　閉じた
Irregular	行く　→　行った来る（く　）　→　来た（き　）する　→　した

Godan Verbs

Godan verbs differ according to their ending, but all verbs with the same ending change in the same way.

All godan verbs that end in 〜う, 〜つ and 〜る change their ending to 〜った:

会う　+　った　=　会った
立つ　+　った　=　立った
代わる　+　った　=　代わった

All godan verbs that end in 〜す change their ending to 〜した:

写す　+　した　=　写した

All godan verbs that end in く change their ending to 〜いた:

書く　+　いた　=　書いた

All godan verbs that end in ぐ change their ending to 〜いだ:

泳ぐ　+　いた　=　泳いだ

And finally, all godan verbs that end in む change their ending to 〜んだ:

休む　+　んだ　=　休んだ
学ぶ　+　んだ　=　学んだ　　

The verb 行く is the only exception among the godan verbs. It ends in 〜く so we would normally expect it to behave like 書く above, but in fact the past tense is:

行く　+　った　=　行った

Ichidan Verbs

For ichidan verbs, we simply remove the 〜る from the dictionary form and add 〜た:

食べる　+　た　=　食べた
見る　+　た　=　見た

Irregular Verbs

Finally, we have our two irregular verbs. These two are always irregular no matter what verb form we're talking about (and there are only two of them—hurray!):

来る　+　た　=　来た（き　）
する　+　た　=　した

So there you have it. Now you know how to conjugate verbs into the past form!