Verbs: perfect tense

We have seen two tenses so far. Those are the building blocks of English:

• Simple tense: for general truths or predictions about present, past and future
• Continuous tense: for actual specific actions happening at a clear point in time (present, past or future)

What’s missing? Something that happened but is now done. Continuous might talk about something that started and is still going on. Perfect talks about something that used to be going on, but is now over.

This is the perfect tense. No, it’s not because the grammar is “beautiful” or “the best”. It’s because “perfect” is the Latin word for “complete”.

This tense is more difficult than the others, though! You can get by fine with the simple and continuous. We’re going into the advanced grammar here. It’s okay to take a break and practice the other tenses first.

Because anything that is done … could have started in a number of ways. Which means there are 6 variations of the perfect tense!

Perfect tense is for completed actions. They started and happened before the time in the sentence, and they are completed now. (Can also mean one “instance” of the action is completed, but the action itself continues.)

The participle

For this tense, we need another way to write our verb. This is called the past participle.

Yes, that is the mysterious word you saw in the tables for auxiliary verbs!

• To be => past participle is been
• To do => past participle is done
• To have => past particiepl is had

Now you finally use it.

For most verbs, the past participle is the same as the past version. Slap a "-(e)d" at the end and you’re done.

For irregular verbs, this is different. That’s why they are irregular. In general, though, those will …

• Either end with -(e)n. (“I spoke” => “I have spoken.”)
• Or be identical to the regular form. (“I read a book” => “I have read a book”. This verb is both present and past participle.)

Simple Present Perfect

Constructed using to have (present form) + past participle.

Use it for:

• A repeated or continuous action. So it is “completed” regularly. (“I have cycled all my life” means you’ve started and finished the act of cycling numerous times in your life.)
• A repeated action without a clear indication of time. (“We have been to the zoo several times”. The action is done. You’re already back from each of those trips. But it’s not clear when you went to the zoo exactly.)
• An action that was completed in very recent past. (When the word just is added.)
• An action when the time is not important, but the result.
• An action that is completed, but the period in which it happens is still going on. (“I have thought about Christmas all year.” The action of thinking about Christmas is done, many times actually. But we’re still in the same year, and that’s what’s important.)

Continuous Present Perfect

Constructed with to have + been + continuous verb form.

It’s used for actions that started an unspecified time before now and are still going on in the present.

It can also be used for actions that have just finished, and we are interested in the results.

But, didn’t you say this was for “completed” actions? Yes, this distinction is quite subtle. It might take a while to grasp.

Let’s look at the example above: “I have been cycling to school every day for years”

The nouns at the end, which indicate time, are vital. Without them, you’d use a different tense. Without them, the whole sentence would be in a different time:

• I was cycling to school, when … => an ongoing action in the past, so continuous tense
• I cycled to school for years => a general habit from the past, so simple tense

So what makes this different? Those days, those years, are already completed. You’ve been cycling every day, and all those days are in the past and completed. That’s why you use perfect tense.

Try to remember it that way. Whenever a sentence mentions a time period that is completed, repeated, or in the past, the tense changes to perfect tense. If you leave out those nouns, the tense changes with it.

Simple Past Perfect

Constructed using a to have (past form) + past participle.

What’s the difference with the “Simple Present Perfect”? I mean, that one alread talked about actions that started or completed before now?

This one goes back even further. The whole sentence is in the past, because of nouns that indicate this. Notice how each of the examples uses a time indication: “that morning”, “when I arrived”, “when the computer crashed”.

Something happened in the past. Another thing happened before that.

That’s how this tense is usually used. To make clear one event happened before another in the past.

Continuous Past Perfect

Constructed using to have (past form) + been + continuous form.

Again, this is the same as the continuous present, but even earlier. The whole sentence is in the past, so the moment before that is “even more in the past”.

The example sentence could be rewritten to:

This tense is often used in reported speech. Somebody is talking about an event in the past. And in that event, another statement is made about what happened before that. (In a sense, the perfect tense is about “the past before the past”.)

Simple Future Perfect

Constructed using will have + past participle.

Use it to refer to a point in the future when an action is completed. We place ourselves in the future—and we see that a certain action is now done or finished!

Continuous Future Perfect

Constructed using will have been + continuous form.

As expected, this is the same as the simple tense. But now the action in the future is still going on. It’s true now and it will be true in the future.

But remember, this is the perfect tense. So it’s only used if the sentence also contains a time indication that indicates this is a repeated action, completed regularly.

The example above could be written in other tenses:

• I will live in Manchester! => it’s not true now, but it’s a spontaneous promise or decision for the future
• I will be living in Manchester for all of 2016 => in an upcoming time period, the action of living there will be ongoing
• If I die tomorrow, I will have lived in Manchester all my life => once dead, the action of “living” doesn’t continue anymore, so it’s not continuous