The preterite of recoger is used to express when someone picked up or collected something at a specific moment in the past. For example, “I picked up the kids from school” – “Recogí a los niños del colegio.”

This verb follows the regular -er conjugation pattern in the preterite tense. It’s a straightforward verb that follows all the regular patterns without any changes.

Conjugations

Conjugations of Recoger (to pick up/collect) in the Preterite (Past) Tense tense (Castilian Spanish):

The Preterite of recoger indicates completed actions of collecting or picking up.

To pick up/collect: Used for gathering items, for example Recogí las llaves del suelo (I picked up the keys from the floor), or Recogieron toda la basura (They collected all the trash).

To pick up someone: Describes collecting people, for example Recogí a mi hermana del aeropuerto (I picked up my sister from the airport).

Examples

Examples of Recoger in the Preterite (Past) Tense

Recogí las flores del jardín. (I picked the flowers from the garden.)

¿Recogiste a los niños del colegio? (Did you pick up the children from school?)

Recogió todos los papeles del suelo. (He/she picked up all the papers from the floor.)

Recogimos la mesa después de cenar. (We cleared the table after dinner.)

Los voluntarios recogieron la basura de la playa. (The volunteers picked up the trash from the beach.)

Recogiste tu habitación muy rápido. (You cleaned up your room very quickly.)

Recogió el paquete de la oficina de correos. (He/she picked up the package from the post office.)

Recogimos manzanas en el huerto. (We picked apples in the orchard.)

Recogieron firmas para la petición. (They collected signatures for the petition.)

Recogí mis documentos del consulado. (I picked up my documents from the consulate.)

¿Dónde recogiste ese folleto? (Where did you pick up that brochure?)

Recogió a su amigo del aeropuerto. (He/she picked up their friend from the airport.)

Recogimos donaciones para el refugio. (We collected donations for the shelter.)

Recogieron sus pertenencias después del incidente. (They gathered their belongings after the incident.)

Recogí el vestido de la tintorería. (I picked up the dress from the dry cleaner’s.)

Conjugations with English Translations

Conjugations of Recoger (to pick up/collect) in the Preterite (Past) Tense tense (Castilian Spanish) with English Translations:

This post covers Castilian Spanish. For Latin American Spanish, click here

Synonyms

The Preterite tense is also known as the Simple Past, Past Simple, Definite Past, Absolute Past, or Past Tense Indicative in English, and as Pretérito Perfecto Simple, Pretérito Indefinido, Pretérito Simple, Pasado Simple, or Pretérito de Indicativo in Spanish.