Passives

Do you know how to use the passive voice to change the focus of a sentence? Test what you know with interactive exercises and read the explanation to help you.

Look at these examples to see how the passive voice is used.

A lot of olive oil is produced in Italy.
This book was written by Angela Davis.
The suspect will be released tomorrow.
This product has not been tested on animals.

Try this exercise to test your grammar.

Grammar test 1: Grammar B1-B2: Passives: 1

Read the explanation to learn more.

Grammar explanation

We use the passive voice to change the focus of the sentence.

My bike was stolen. (passive – focus on my bike)
Someone stole my bike. (active – focus on someone)

We often use the passive:

when we prefer not to mention who or what does the action (for example, it's not known, it's obvious or we don't want to say)
so that we can start a sentence with the most important or most logical information
in more formal or scientific writing.

How we make the passive

We make the passive using the verb be + past participle. We start the sentence with the object.

Avatar	was	directed by James Cameron.
↓	↓	↓
Object	+ be +	past participle

It is not always necessary to add who or what did the action.

My flight	is	cancelled.
↓	↓	↓
Object	+ be +	past participle

Only the form of be changes to make the tense. The past participle stays the same. Here are examples of the passive in its most common tenses.

Tense	Example	Structure
Present simple	Alioli is made from oil, garlic and salt.	is/are + past participle
Present continuous	The hall is being painted this week.	is/are being + past participle
Past simple	John F. Kennedy was assassinated in 1963.	was/were + past participle
Past continuous	The signs were being put up last week.	was/were being + past participle
Present perfect	Oranges have been grown here for centuries.	has/have been + past participle
Past perfect	When he got home, he found that his flat had been burgled.	had been + past participle
Future simple	The work will be finished next week.	will be + past participle

Do this exercise to test your grammar again.

Grammar test 2: Grammar B1-B2: Passives: 2

Try another grammar lesson

Language level

B1 - Intermediate

Hi, I have a question and I hopes the learnEnglish team to answer me. In grammar test 2, in the example which it says, someone _ my wallet and left at reception, here the correct answer is " had found" ok, although the structure here is had been+ past participle, then how it used had found. Thanks for you.

Hello Pola,

This page is about how to correctly form and also use the passive voice. It's not correct to use it in a sentence like this one, and that's what this question is testing.

If you already knew this, that's great! It shows that you understand this important point.

All the best,

Kirk

The LearnEnglish Team

Hi! What’s the difference between A lot of time is wasted on pointless meetings in this company. VS. A lot of time have been wasted on pointless meetings in this company.

Hello Fiona,

The difference is the difference between the present simple ('is') and the present perfect ('has been' -- notice that 'have been' is not correct because 'time' takes a singular verb). The first one is a more general statement that could refer to a long period of time and the second one refers to a more specific time that began sometime in the past and is still happening now.

I'd suggest you read more a bit more about this on our Present simple and Present perfect pages.

All the best,

Kirk

The LearnEnglish Team

Thanks for replying! Your explanation is helpful!

Another similar usage came up to me was that, why that we more often say “things have changed” but not “things are changed”?

Hello, e.g, The work will be finished next week. Could I rewrite the sentence as: e.g, The work will have finished next week. My appreciations.

Hello Via,

Yes, that is grammatically correct and the two sentences effectively mean the same thing. The first one is much more commonly used.

All the best,

Kirk

The LearnEnglish Team

This is the course that I try to capture very well and I enjoy learning passive voice.

Hello, I have a very simple question Can I say Nobody saw the cup And how to change into passive. Can I say " The cup wasn't seen by anybody. " or " The cup was seen by nobody "

Do you need to improve your English grammar?

Join thousands of learners from around the world who are improving their English grammar with our online courses.

Find out more