The imperfetto of avere is one of the friendliest paradigms in Italian: it is completely regular, with no stem changes, no irregular forms, no surprises. The verb that gives you nightmare-level orthographic puzzles in the presente (with the silent h in ho, hai, ha, hanno) becomes well-behaved in the imperfetto. The h disappears entirely, the stem stays put, and you simply add the standard -ere imperfetto endings: avevo, avevi, aveva, avevamo, avevate, avevano.
But while the morphology is easy, this is one of the most semantically loaded verbs in any past narration. Avere imperfetto is how you say "I was twenty," "we had a dog," "she had a headache," "they had three children" — and it is the auxiliary that lets you build the trapassato prossimo for transitive verbs (avevo mangiato, avevamo visto). This page covers all of that.
The conjugation
| Person | Conjugation | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| io | avevo | avévo |
| tu | avevi | avévi |
| lui / lei / Lei | aveva | avéva |
| noi | avevamo | avevàmo |
| voi | avevate | avevàte |
| loro | avevano | avévano |
Avevo vent'anni quando sono partito per Londra.
I was twenty when I left for London.
Avevi sempre quel cappotto rosso, te lo ricordi?
You always used to have that red coat, do you remember?
Mia nonna aveva un cane di nome Briciola.
My grandmother had a dog named Briciola.
Avevamo molti amici quando vivevamo a Roma.
We had a lot of friends when we lived in Rome.
Avevate ancora la macchina vecchia allora?
Did you all still have the old car back then?
I miei genitori avevano una piccola cartoleria in centro.
My parents had a small stationery shop downtown.
Yes, the same stress trap
Avere imperfetto follows the universal imperfetto stress rule: the loro form is rizotonic. Avévano, with stress on the second syllable, not avevàno. The pattern is identical to credevo (the regular -ere model from the regular -ere page) — singular forms and loro stress the -ev- core; noi and voi shift the stress one syllable right.
Why this verb has no h
Notice that all six forms of avere imperfetto start with a, with no silent h. That's because the silent h in the presente (ho, hai, ha, hanno) exists for one specific reason: to distinguish those four monosyllabic forms from the homophones o (or), ai (to the), a (to/at), anno (year). In the imperfetto, the forms are longer and there is no homophone to disambiguate from — so no h is needed.
This is a useful test case for one of the deeper truths about Italian orthography: silent letters are almost always functional, not historical. They earn their keep by preventing ambiguity. When ambiguity disappears, so do the letters.
What avere imperfetto is used for
This verb anchors a long list of high-frequency past-tense expressions for English speakers.
1. Past possession
Avevo una macchina rossa quando ero studente.
I had a red car when I was a student.
Mia zia aveva una bellissima collezione di dischi.
My aunt had a beautiful record collection.
Non avevamo molto, ma eravamo felici.
We didn't have much, but we were happy.
The contrast with passato prossimo is illuminating. Avevo una macchina describes ongoing possession — at that period in my life, a car was part of my world. Ho avuto una macchina ("I have had a car") frames the ownership as a closed event with a beginning and an end — I owned a car for some bounded period and then I didn't. Both can be true of the same situation; you choose based on whether you want to describe the state (imperfetto) or the closed history (passato prossimo).
Avevo un cane da bambino.
I had a dog as a child. (state, scene)
Ho avuto un cane per dodici anni.
I had a dog for twelve years. (closed, completed history)
2. Age in the past
This is one of the most important uses. To say someone's age at a specific past moment, Italian overwhelmingly prefers the imperfetto:
Avevo dieci anni quando mio padre mi ha regalato la prima bicicletta.
I was ten when my father gave me my first bicycle.
Mia madre aveva trent'anni quando sono nato io.
My mother was thirty when I was born.
Quanti anni avevi quando hai imparato a guidare?
How old were you when you learned to drive?
English allows two phrasings — "I was twenty when I left" or, more formally, "I had been twenty when I left" — but Italian almost always uses avevo (imperfetto) for "I was [age]" in narrative past. Ho avuto vent'anni is technically grammatical but means something quite different: "I have at one point been twenty," which sounds bizarre because everyone passes through every age, so framing it as a closed event is strange.
3. Past relationships and family
Avevamo tre figli, due maschi e una femmina.
We had three children, two boys and a girl.
Aveva un fratello più grande, ma è morto giovane.
He had an older brother, but he died young.
Da bambino avevo molti amici nel quartiere.
As a kid I had a lot of friends in the neighborhood.
4. Past bodily and emotional states (avere + bare noun)
The same family of expressions you learned in the presente of avere — ho fame, ho sete, ho freddo, ho caldo, ho sonno, ho paura — all transpose into the past with avere imperfetto:
| Italian | English |
|---|---|
| avevo fame | I was hungry |
| avevi sete | you were thirsty |
| aveva freddo | she was cold |
| avevamo caldo | we were hot |
| avevate paura | you were scared |
| avevano sonno | they were sleepy |
| avevo mal di testa | I had a headache |
| avevo fretta | I was in a hurry |
Avevo fame, era ora di pranzo.
I was hungry, it was lunchtime.
I bambini avevano sonno e ho cercato di metterli a letto.
The kids were sleepy and I tried to put them to bed.
Avevamo paura di perdere il treno, abbiamo preso un taxi.
We were afraid of missing the train, we took a taxi.
Aveva mal di testa da due giorni, finalmente si è decisa a chiamare il medico.
She'd had a headache for two days, she finally decided to call the doctor.
This pattern is critical because English speakers want to say ero affamato or even stavo essendo affamato — both wrong. The Italian sensation is something you have, not something you are, and the imperfetto carries that ongoing possession into the past.
5. Avere as auxiliary in the trapassato prossimo
This is the second-biggest job avere imperfetto does. Combined with a past participle, it forms the trapassato prossimo — the "past of the past," used when you need to describe an action that happened before another past action.
Quando sono arrivato, mia moglie aveva già preparato la cena.
When I arrived, my wife had already made dinner.
Avevamo visto il film l'anno prima, lo conoscevamo bene.
We had seen the film the year before, we knew it well.
I ragazzi avevano finito i compiti prima di pranzo, così potevano giocare.
The kids had finished their homework before lunch, so they could play.
Mio nonno aveva lavorato tutta la vita in fabbrica.
My grandfather had worked his whole life in a factory.
The pattern is avere imperfetto + participio passato for transitive verbs. For verbs that take essere as auxiliary (motion verbs, reflexives), you'd use essere imperfetto + participio passato instead — see the auxiliary overview for the full split. The trapassato prossimo is one of the most common compound tenses in Italian narrative, and avere imperfetto is half of what makes it possible.
Imperfetto vs passato prossimo with avere
The contrast with avere is especially worth examining because the choice often shifts the type of meaning, not just the aspect:
| Imperfetto (state) | Passato prossimo (event) |
|---|---|
| Avevo una macchina. (I owned one) | Ho avuto una macchina. (I owned one for some bounded time) |
| Avevo paura. (I was afraid, ongoing) | Ho avuto paura. (I got scared at a moment) |
| Aveva un cane. (she owned one) | Ha avuto un cane. (she owned one for some period) |
| Avevo dieci anni. (I was ten years old) | (rarely said: ho avuto dieci anni) |
Avevo paura del buio da bambino.
I was afraid of the dark as a kid. (ongoing childhood state)
Ho avuto paura quando ho sentito il rumore.
I got scared when I heard the noise. (single moment of fear)
The imperfetto avevo paura describes a sustained fear — something I lived with. The passato prossimo ho avuto paura marks a specific moment when fear hit. Both are valid; both are different sentences.
A common pattern: imperfetto pair
A very Italian rhythm in narration is to set up a state with avere imperfetto and then provide a contrasting event with passato prossimo:
Avevo fame, così ho mangiato un panino.
I was hungry, so I ate a sandwich.
Avevamo paura di perdere l'aereo, ma siamo arrivati in tempo.
We were afraid of missing the plane, but we arrived on time.
Aveva mal di testa, ha preso un'aspirina ed è andato a letto.
He had a headache, he took an aspirin, and went to bed.
The imperfetto provides the why — the state that makes the event meaningful. The passato prossimo provides the what — the action taken in response. This pairing is so natural to Italian narration that the absence of imperfetti is often a giveaway that a non-native speaker wrote the text.
Common mistakes
❌ I miei genitori avevàno tre figli.
Incorrect — wrong stress on the loro form. The accent should be on the root, not on the -và-no.
✅ I miei genitori avévano tre figli.
Correct — avévano stresses the second syllable.
❌ Quando ho dieci anni, andavo a scuola a piedi.
Incorrect — 'when I was ten' requires the imperfetto: avevo dieci anni.
✅ Quando avevo dieci anni, andavo a scuola a piedi.
Correct — both verbs in the imperfetto for past habitual narration.
❌ Sono stato venti anni quando mi sono laureato.
Incorrect — Italian doesn't 'be' an age, it 'has' an age. And in the past, it's the imperfetto.
✅ Avevo vent'anni quando mi sono laureato.
Correct — avevo vent'anni for past age.
❌ Habevamo una casa al mare.
Incorrect — only the four presente forms (ho, hai, ha, hanno) take the silent h. Avere imperfetto has no h in any form.
✅ Avevamo una casa al mare.
Correct — no h.
❌ Ero fame quando sono tornato a casa.
Incorrect — Italian uses avere for sensations like hunger, even in the past.
✅ Avevo fame quando sono tornato a casa.
Correct — avevo fame for past hunger.
❌ Loro aveva tre cani.
Incorrect — aveva is the third singular form. The third plural is avevano.
✅ Loro avevano tre cani.
Correct — avevano in the third plural.
❌ Ho avuto venti anni nel 2010.
Strange — Italian rarely uses passato prossimo for age. Use the imperfetto.
✅ Avevo vent'anni nel 2010.
Correct — age at a past moment is imperfetto.
Key takeaways
The imperfetto of avere is avevo, avevi, aveva, avevamo, avevate, avevano. The conjugation is completely regular — same endings as any other -ere verb in the imperfetto, with no h, no irregular stem.
Three things to internalize:
The loro form is rizotonic: avévano, not avevàno. The same universal imperfetto stress rule applies.
All your present-tense avere idioms transpose to the past with the imperfetto: avevo fame, avevo sete, avevo freddo, avevo paura, avevo sonno, avevo mal di testa, avevo fretta — and most importantly, avevo [number] anni for age at a past moment.
Avere imperfetto + participio passato = trapassato prossimo, the "past of the past" that lets you describe one past action happening before another. This is essential for any complex narration. Avevo già mangiato, aveva visto il film, avevamo finito i compiti.
Together with essere imperfetto, avere completes the irregular-irregular pair you need for the imperfetto. With these, plus the three regular conjugation classes, you have the entire imperfetto system at your disposal.
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Open the Italian course →Related Topics
- Imperfetto: Regular -are VerbsA2 — How to conjugate -are verbs in the imperfetto, why English speakers chronically under-use this tense, and the stress trap that betrays every learner.
- Imperfetto: Regular -ere VerbsA2 — How to conjugate -ere verbs in the imperfetto — why this is the most regular tense in Italian, and the three sneaky exceptions that fool everyone.
- Imperfetto: Regular -ire Verbs (Including -isco)A2 — How to conjugate -ire verbs in the imperfetto, why -isco verbs lose their infix here, and the deeper rule that explains when -isc- ever appears.
- Imperfetto: EssereA2 — How to conjugate essere in the imperfetto — the highly irregular forms, the fairy-tale 'c'era una volta,' and why this is the most-used past-tense verb in Italian.
- Presente: Avere (to have)A1 — How to conjugate avere in the present indicative — its silent h, its many idiomatic uses for states English expresses with 'to be,' and its role as the default auxiliary in compound tenses.
- Auxiliary Verbs: avere, essere, stareA2 — The three auxiliary verbs that build Italian's compound tenses, the progressive, and the imminent future — and why getting them right is foundational.