Through either morphological or functional approaches, previous research has examined how instructed second language (L2) learners develop control over a challenging area of French: the use of the imparfait. In order to better understand this challenge, this cross‐sectional study utilized both approaches and examined how 94 university Hispanophone learners of French developed control over 5 L2 imperfective functions with 4 verb types in 2 written narratives. Each L2 learner was assigned to 1 of 6 groups depending on the number of imperfective instances in their texts. In order to identify features of learner language, L2 imperfective use was compared to the imperfective found in first language (L1) Spanish (n = 31) and L1 French (n = 47) narratives. The analyses of the 2,176 instances of L2 imperfective use revealed that this form develops in accordance with a trend whereby a decrease is found from the characterization/state combination, to habituality/telics, to progressivity/nonpunctual dynamic verbs, to inchoative characterization/states, and to frequentation/activities. In contrast to the L1 imperfective in Spanish and French, the L2 imperfective showed variability across these combinations. Moreover, in the L2 narratives, learners favored the characterization/state association at the expense of using other imperfective functions with other verb types.