wählte

Wählte is the past tense form of the German verb wählen, meaning to choose or to vote. It is used to describe selecting something or casting a vote in the past. The sense can cover choosing an object, a person, or a course of action as well as participating in an election.

In the Präteritum, the verb is conjugated as follows: ich wählte, du wähltest, er/sie/es wählte, wir wählten, ihr wähltet, sie wählten. The past participle is gewählt, and in compound tenses the auxiliary verb used is haben, as in Ich habe gewählt. The imperative forms are Wähle! (du) and Wählt! (ihr).

Wählen has two broad uses in German. The first is to vote in elections, where wie sprechen about “eine Stimme abgeben” for a candidate or option. The second is to indicate choosing or selecting something, such as ein Produkt, eine Option oder eine Person. In spoken German, the perfect tense with haben, Ich habe gewählt, is often preferred for past events, while wählte appears more commonly in formal writing or narrative contexts.

The word is closely related to nouns such as Wahl (election, choice) and Wähler (voter). These related terms reflect the core idea of making a selection or decision, whether in a deliberative or a democratic context.