When you start talking about the past in Portuguese, you quickly run into a practical problem: you want to describe lots of different activities, but each one has its own past-tense conjugation.

A very common workaround in European Portuguese is to use ir in the Pretérito Perfeito as a kind of helper verb, followed by an infinitive. This lets you talk about many past actions while only conjugating one verb in the past (ir).

The structure

Use:

• subject + ir (pretérito perfeito) + infinitive

Examples:

• Eu fui jogar ténis hoje de manhã.
• I went to play tennis this morning.
• Ontem fui tomar café com a Daniela.
• Yesterday I went to have coffee with Daniela.

In many contexts, this is close in meaning to using the main verb directly in the Pretérito Perfeito:

• Eu joguei ténis hoje de manhã.
• I played tennis this morning.
• Ontem tomei café com a Daniela.
• Yesterday I had coffee with Daniela.

Both are correct. The ir + infinitive option often sounds very natural in everyday European Portuguese, especially when you are describing activities you “went to do.”

Why this is useful

If you know the past forms of ir, you can describe many common past activities without needing the past tense of every single verb:

• Hoje de manhã fui fazer compras.
• This morning I went shopping.
• No fim de semana passado fui almoçar com os meus pais.
• Last weekend I went to have lunch with my parents.

You still need vocabulary and context, and this won’t fit every situation, but it covers a large chunk of everyday “activities” language.

Conjugation of ir in the Pretérito Perfeito

eu	fui
tu	foste
você, ele, ela	foi
nós	fomos
vocês, eles, elas	foram

When this structure fits best

Use ir + infinitive most naturally when:

• you’re talking about going somewhere to do an activity (explicitly or implicitly)
• the action feels like an “outing” or a planned activity

If you’re simply reporting an action with no “went to do it” nuance, the simple Pretérito Perfeito of the main verb is often the more neutral choice.