French tenses

• French verb tenses


  May seem daunting at first glance, but they're really not as bad as they seem
• Overview of most common French verb tenses

  1. When to use them

  2. Patterns of conjugation for each one
• Le présent


  Used to express something happening right now, in the current moment
• Conjugating verbs in the present tense

  • Not as straightforward
  • Respective patterns for verbs ending in -er, -ir, and -re
  • Many irregular verbs that have their own rules
• Le passé composé


  Used to describe completed actions of the past
• Forming le passé composé


  1. Subject

  2. Avoir or être auxiliary in the present tense

  3. Past participle of the action verb
• Auxiliary verbs for le passé composé

  Use avoir unless the verb falls within the "DR MRS VANDERTRAMP”mnemonic or is reflexive
• Conjugating past participles


  1. -er verbs: drop -er and add -é

  2. -ir verbs: drop -ir and add -i

  3. -re verbs: drop -re and add -u

  4. Some irregular verbs
• L'imparfait


  Used when describing ongoing actions of the past, descriptions of the past, and expressing "I was", "I would", "I used to"
• Conjugating l'imparfait


  Take the new form of the verb in the present tense, remove the -ons ending to get the stem, then add the imparfait endings
• Le passé récent


  Used to describe an action that just happened moments ago
• Forming le passé récent


  Venir (conjugated in the present tense) + de + infinitive of the action verb
• Le plus-que-parfait


  Used to talk about an event of the past that occurred before another event in the past
• Conjugating le plus-que-parfait


  Avoir or être (conjugated in the imparfait) + past participle of the action verb
• Le futur proche


  Describes an action that is going to happen really soon
• Forming le futur proche

  Aller (conjugated in the present tense) + infinitive of the action verb
• Le futur simple


  Used to express "I will do something"
• Conjugating le futur simple


  Take the infinitive of the verb and add the future tense endings
• Le futur antérieur


  Expresses a future event that happens before another future event
• Forming le futur antérieur

  Avoir or être (conjugated in the futur simple) + past participle of the action verb
• Le subjonctif


  Used when expressing a wish, doubt, uncertainty, emotion, judgment, necessity, possibility, or opinion
• The confusing part about le subjonctif is knowing when to use it vs when to use the indicative
• Conjugating le subjonctif présent

  Take the plural ils form of the verb in the present tense, remove the -ent ending, and add the subjonctif endings
• L'impératif


  Used when giving orders, suggestions, or advice
• Conjugating l'impératif


  1. No subject is included, only the verb ending is used

  2. Three ways to conjugate: tu, nous, vous
• Le conditionnel présent


  Used to express something that would happen if a specific condition is met, and for politeness
• Conjugating le conditionnel présent


  Use the infinitive form of the verb and add the conditional endings
• Le conditionnel passé


  Used to express something that would have happened if a condition was met
• Forming le conditionnel passé


  Avoir or être (conjugated in the conditionnel présent) + past participle of the action verb
• Le gérondif


  Used when a second action is being done at the same time as another, often translated as "while" or "by"
• Conjugating le gérondif


  Use en + stem of the verb + -ant
• Le passé simple


  An archaic tense found in literature, not used in everyday spoken French
• As a learner, you don't need to know how to conjugate le passé simple unless you want to write literature in French