The passé composé

The passé composé is the past tense of everyday spoken French: what happened, once, and is over. Hier, j'ai vu un film. Nous sommes allés au parc. It is made of two words, and once you know how they fit together, you can use it with any verb.

How to form it

Auxiliary in the présent + participe passé. The auxiliary is avoir for most verbs, être for a short list of verbs and for reflexive verbs.

Which auxiliary goes with which verb has its own page: être or avoir in the passé composé.

The participe passé

Regular verbs build it from the infinitive: -er → -é (parler → parlé), -ir → -i (finir → fini), -re → -u (vendre → vendu). Irregular verbs have their own, and they are the ones to learn by heart. Here are the participles of the 50 most common verbs:

Negation and questions

Ne… pas goes around the auxiliary, not the participle: je n'ai pas mangé, elle n'est pas venue. In an inverted question, the pronoun follows the auxiliary: As-tu fini ? Est-elle partie ? In speech, a rising intonation is enough: Tu as fini ?

Passé composé or imparfait?

The passé composé tells what happened: a completed action, an event. The imparfait describes the background: what was going on, habits, descriptions. Il pleuvait quand je suis sorti. It rained (background), I went out (event).

Practise it

Put it into practice with the passé composé exercises: twenty real sentences to complete, corrected as you go. Each verb page also shows its passé composé with example sentences, for example faire or prendre.