Past habits

Do you know how to talk about past habits using used to, would, and the past simple? Enhance your knowledge with a lesson given below and the grammar explanation to guide you better.

Look at these examples to see how used to, would, and the past simple are used.

• She used to play soccer every Saturday.

• I didn't use to enjoy spicy food.

• We would often visit our grandparents during the summer.

• But one summer, we traveled to the coast instead.

Grammar explanation - Past habits: 'used to', 'would' and past simple

When we talk about things in the past that are not true anymore, we can do it in different ways.

1. Used to + infinitive

We can use used to to talk about past states that are not true anymore.

• We used to own a dog when I was young.

• There didn't use to be a park in this neighborhood. When was it built?

• Did you use to play an instrument?

We can also use used to to talk about past habits (repeated past actions) that don't happen anymore.

• I used to jog every morning before work.

• He used to drink coffee, but he switched to tea last year.

Used to + infinitive should not be confused with be/get used to + -ing, which has a different meaning. The difference is covered here.

2. Would

We can use would to talk about repeated past actions that don't happen anymore.

• Every Sunday I would visit my grandparents.

• My sister would play the piano beautifully at family gatherings.

Would for past habits is slightly more formal than used to. It is often used in stories. We don't normally use the negative or question form of would for past habits. Note that we can't usually use would to talk about past states.

3. Past simple

We can always use the past simple as an alternative to used to or would to talk about past states or habits. The main difference is that the past simple doesn't emphasize the repeated or continuous nature of the action or situation. Also, the past simple doesn't make it so clear that the thing is no longer true.

• We visited the same lake every summer.

• We used to visit the same lake every summer.

• We would visit the same lake every summer.

If something happened only once, we must use the past simple.

• I traveled to Japan in 2018.

Try another grammar lesson