Danish Past Tense
Danish has two regular past tense patterns (-ede and -te) plus irregular verbs that change their vowel, much like English “sing → sang”.
The two patterns
Group 1: -ede
Multi-syllable verbs: arbejde → arbejdede, leve → levede
Group 2: -te
Short-stem verbs: spise → spiste, købe → købte
Common verbs
Infinitive
Past
Type
English
spise
spiste
Regular (-te)
ate
arbejde
arbejdede
Regular (-ede)
worked
købe
købte
Regular (-te)
bought
se
så
Irregular
saw
gå
gik
Irregular
went
drikke
drak
Irregular
drank
Look for time markers
Words like i går (yesterday), sidste uge (last week), and dengang (back then) signal past tense. They help you know which form to use.