Вчера я пошёл на работу.

Because пошёл and шёл are not interchangeable.

• пошёл = set off / went off / started going
• шёл = was going / was walking / went with focus on the process

In Вчера я пошёл на работу, the speaker is talking about a completed action: yesterday, he went off to work.

If you said Вчера я шёл на работу, it would usually mean Yesterday I was on my way to work or I was walking/going to work, with attention on the movement itself, not simply the fact that he went.

So пошёл is the more natural choice for a simple completed event.

The dictionary form is пойти.

This verb is:

• perfective
• a verb of motion
• usually translated as to go, to set off

Its past tense forms are:

• пошёл — masculine singular
• пошла — feminine singular
• пошло — neuter singular
• пошли — plural

So in your sentence, пошёл tells us the speaker is male.

A woman would say:

Вчера я пошла на работу.

The only change is the past tense ending:

• male: пошёл
• female: пошла

Russian past tense verbs agree with the gender of the subject in the singular.

In Russian, past tense singular forms are built from a form that behaves a bit like an adjective in agreement.

That is why you get:

• я пошёл if the speaker is male
• я пошла if the speaker is female

English does not do this, so it often feels unusual to learners at first. But in Russian, this is completely normal for past tense singular verbs.

Because на работу means to work as a destination, while на работе means at work as a location.

Russian uses different cases depending on whether you mean:

• motion toward a place → на + accusative
• location in/at a place → на + prepositional

So:

• Я пошёл на работу. = I went to work.
• Я был на работе. = I was at work.

That is why работу is used here, not работе.

Because the preposition на takes the accusative when it answers the question куда? (to where?).

In this sentence:

• на работу = to work
• question: куда? = where to?

So работа changes to the accusative singular работу.

Compare:

• на работу — to work
• на работе — at work

This is a very common Russian pattern with places and destinations.

Literally, пойти belongs to the идти / пойти family, which is the basic one-way verb of motion and often suggests going on foot.

However, in everyday Russian, phrases like идти на работу or пойти на работу are often used more generally for going to work, without strongly focusing on whether the person walked, took the bus, drove, etc.

So the sentence does not necessarily mean he walked all the way to work. It usually just means he went to work.

If Russian wants to make transport explicit, it can do so:

• поехал на работу — went to work by transport
• пошёл пешком на работу — went to work on foot

Yes, Russian often can omit subject pronouns when the meaning is clear.

So in context, a speaker might say:

Вчера пошёл на работу.

But there are a few things to know:

1. Russian does not omit pronouns as automatically as some other languages.
2. Including я is completely normal and neutral.
3. In the past tense, the verb already shows gender, but not person as clearly as present tense forms do.

So Вчера я пошёл на работу is a very normal full sentence, especially in a textbook or when there is no previous context.

Yes, the word order could be different. Russian word order is flexible.

Вчера я пошёл на работу is a very natural neutral order because it sets the time first: Yesterday...

Other possibilities include:

• Я вчера пошёл на работу. — also natural; slightly more centered on I
• На работу я пошёл вчера. — stronger emphasis on yesterday
• Пошёл я вчера на работу... — more storytelling or conversational in tone

So the original sentence is normal and straightforward, but not the only possible order.

Yes, but it means something slightly different.

• пошёл на работу focuses on setting off / going to work
• ходил на работу often focuses more on the fact of going there and, implicitly, the whole trip or visit

In many contexts, ходил can suggest:

• I went to work (and came back)
• I did go to work yesterday
• the fact of the trip, rather than the moment of departure

So:

• Вчера я пошёл на работу = Yesterday I went off to work.
• Вчера я ходил на работу = Yesterday I went to work / I was at work yesterday, with a different motion-verb nuance.

This is a very common contrast in Russian motion verbs.

They are close, but not identical.

• пошёл на работу = went / set off to work
• ушёл на работу = left for work / went away to work

ушёл emphasizes departure from the place where the speaker or subject was before. It often has the feeling of left.

For example:

• Он ушёл на работу в семь. = He left for work at seven.

Your sentence with пошёл is more neutral and simply states that he went to work.

Пошёл is pronounced roughly like pa-SHYOL.

Important points:

• the stress is on ё
• ё always indicates the sound yo
• in careful writing, ё helps show both pronunciation and stress

So пошёл is not pronounced like poshel with a plain e sound. It is specifically pa-shyol.

You may also see пошел written without the dots in ordinary Russian texts, but it is still usually understood as пошёл. Russian often omits the dots over ё in everyday writing, though learners should remember the real pronunciation.

It is perfective, because пойти is a perfective verb.

That matters because perfective verbs usually present an action as:

• complete
• bounded
• seen as a whole event

So Вчера я пошёл на работу presents the going-to-work event as a completed fact.

If you used an imperfective form instead, the meaning would shift toward:

• process
• repetition
• background action
• general fact, depending on the verb

This perfective/imperfective contrast is one of the most important parts of Russian grammar, and motion verbs show it very clearly.