Which past tense to use in french

It also makes suppositions about possible past events. Get to know the irregular verbs with our list of the most common irregular verbs in French. The verbs are presented together with their conjugations in all tenses.

I have just finished an amazing book. I had just gone out when it started to rain. Le plus-que-parfait The plus-que-parfait corresponds to the past perfect tense in English. Do you notice the difference? In French, the past tense works basically the same way as in English. If you find yourself googling How to say had in French, then read more to learn more rules on how to form past tense in French.

While the other tenses in French such as the imperfect, future, and conditional use only a single verb with changes in the ending, the past tense makes use of two parts:. First, you start with the infinitive of the verb, and then proceed to the following changes in the ending. Example: finir to finish becomes fini , partir to leave becomes parti. Example: attendre to wait becomes attendu , descendre to go down becomes descendu.

So now the question is, when do you use it? When we say reflexive verbs, these are the French verbs that appear with the pronoun se or the shortened form s' before it. These action words are used when the subject is the same person as the object. But if you say 'he came down the stairs' the stairs being the object, that is when you use avoir il a descendu l'escalier. Therefore, their endings change to accommodate the masculine and feminine, as well as the singular and plural forms. Just like in any other case whether in grammar or in real life, there are always a set of rule-breakers.

These irregulars appear in the past tense as well. With this article, you won't have to google what is was in French or any past participle in French! Frederic Bibard is the founder of Talk in French, a company that helps french learners to practice and improve their french. Macaron addict.

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This agreement is necessary in the following situations:. This is because the reflexive pronoun is an indirect object. Although it is reflexive, the past participle of the verb se rendre compte to realise does not agree with the subject of the sentence. This is because the word compte acts as a direct object se rendre quoi? Our online exercises for French help you to learn and practice grammar rules in an interactive manner.