ABSTRACT
German has no forms like the extended verb forms in English, so that ich kaufe can correspond to English ‘I buy’, ‘I am buying’, ‘I do buy’. Whereas English can distinguish an ongoing action by a progressive tense (e.g. ‘I’m reading’), this is not possible in German. Instead you often find an adverbial such as gerade (e.g. Ich lese gerade):
Otherwise, though, the use of the tenses in German is close to that of the corresponding English ones, and in most cases the same tense is used in German as would be used in the corresponding context in English. Sections 7.2-7.3 give you information about important instances where German and English do not agree in the use of tense.
