The Ultimate Guide to

the Passé Composé

by Benjamin Houy 9 Comments

“Please don’t use the passé simple tense in your essay.”

This is the first sentence our professor told us, a group of French college
students, as we were about to take an exam.

“Most French college students don’t know how to use the passé simple
properly”, he went on.

My professor was right. Most French people don’t know how to use the passé
simple properly because they rarely need to use it.

This is great news for you as a French learner, because it means you probably
don’t need to bother learning this complicated tense.

if your only goal is to communicate with locals, you only need to know
two French past tenses: le passé composé and l’imparfait.

Today’s article will show you when and how to use the passé composé! You
will see, it’s not that complicated!

Contents [hide]
 1 When should you use the passé composé?
 2 How to conjugate verbs in the passé composé tense
o 2.1 #1 Choose your helping verb
o 2.2 Conjugation
o 2.3 Translation
o 2.4 Conjugation
o 2.5 Translation
o 2.6 #2 Add the past participle
o 2.7 Pronoun
o 2.8 Conjugation
o 2.9 Translation
o 2.10 Pronoun
o 2.11 Conjugation
o 2.12 Translation
o 2.13 Pronoun
o 2.14 Conjugation
o 2.15 Translation
o 2.16 Pronoun
o 2.17 Conjugation
o 2.18 Translation
o 2.19 #3 Make the verb agree in number and gender
o 2.20 Voulez-vous parler français ?

When should you use the passé composé?

The bad news is that French people use several past tenses.

The good news is that le passé composé is the most common tense and
that you can already express yourself well if it’s the only French past
tense you know.

Le passé composé is the equivalent of:

 The simple past (j’ai fait, I did)

 The present perfect (j’ai fait, I have done)

You use it to highlight the consequences of past actions and to talk about:

 Completed actions.
 Repeated actions.
 Series of actions.
 Conditions in likely situations.

How to conjugate verbs in the passé composé tense

The passé composé is a compound tense, meaning you need two
components to conjugate a verb.

1. A helping verb (être or avoir) conjugated in the present tense.

2. The past participle of the verb you want to conjugate.

Let’s see how this works in practice!

#1 Choose your helping verb

The first step to conjugating a verb in the passé composé is to find out
what helping verb (also called auxiliary verb) it uses: être or avoir.
Avoir
Avoir (to have) is the most common helping verb.

If you ever find yourself in the middle of a conversation wondering whether to

use avoir or être to conjugate in the passé composé, choose avoir. It’s the
most common helping verb and is likely to be the one you need.

Once you know the verb you want to conjugate in the passé composé uses
“avoir”, you simply need to conjugate avoir in the present tense and add the
past participle.

Conjugation Translation

J’ai I have

Tu as You have

Il/elle/on a He/she/it has

Nous avons We have

Vous avez You have

Ils/elles ont They have

Être

Être is less common than “avoir” as a helping verb but a few common French
verbs use it when conjugated in the passé composé.

An easy way to remember some of these verbs is to use the Dr and Mrs
Vandertrampp mnemonics.

Each letter in the sentence Dr and Mrs Vandertrampp represents the

beginning of a verb that uses être as a helping verb when conjugated in the
passé composé.

 Devenir
 Revenir
 Mourir
 Retourner
 Sortir
 Venir
 Arriver
 Naitre
 Descendre
 Entrer
 Rentrer
 Tomber
 Rester
 Aller
 Monter
 Partir
 Passer

Other verbs that use être include:

 All reflexive verbs (verbs that use “se”.)

 Some verbs indicating movement or a change of state.

Once you know the verb you want to conjugate in the passé composé uses
être, it’s time to conjugate être in the present tense

Conjugation Translation

Je suis I am

Tu es You are

Il/elle/on est He/she/it is

Nous sommes We are

Vous êtes You are

Ils/elles sont They are

#2 Add the past participle

Verbs in the passé composé are formed by putting together a helping
verb (être or avoir) conjugated in the present tense + a past participle.

Once you know what helping verb to use, all you need to do is add the past
participle of the verb you want to conjugate.

The majority of French verbs are regular and forming their past participle is
easy.

Simply use the recipe

below:

Regular ER verbs => é

Regular IR verbs => i
Regular RE verbs => u

Manger => J’ai mangé

Finir => J’ai fini
Vendre => J’ai vendu

There are also a few irregular verb patterns:

 Faire, dire and other verbs in ire => it

 Connaitre and other verbs in aitre => u
 Venir and other verbs in enir => enu
 Prendre and other verbs in -endre => pris

Some irregular verbs won’t match any of these patterns, if that’s the case, you
need to look up the individual past participle conjugation.

Here are a few common irregular verbs to get you started:

Aller

Pronoun Conjugation Translation

Je suis allé I went

Tu es allé You went

Il/elle/on est allé He/she/it went

Nous sommes allés We went

Vous êtes allés You went

Ils/elles sont allés They went

Avoir

Pronoun Conjugation Translation

J’ ai eu I had

Tu as eu You had

Il/elle/on a eu He/she/it had

Nous avons eu We had

Vous avez eu You had

Ils/elles ont eu They had

Être

Pronoun Conjugation Translation

J’ ai été I was

Tu as été You were

Il/elle/on a été He/she/it was

Nous avons été We were

Vous avez été You were

Ils/elles ont été They were

Pouvoir

Pronoun Conjugation Translation

J’ ai pu I could

Tu as pu You could

Il/elle/on a pu He/she/it could

Nous avons pu We could

Vous avez pu You could

Ils/elles ont pu They could

#3 Make the verb agree in number and gender

Passé composé agreement of verbs using être as a helping verb

Verbs using être as a helping verb to form their passé composé agree in
gender and number with the subject.

 Je suis arrivé(e) => you add a e if the subject if female.

 Ils sont arrivé(s) (you add a “s” is the subject is plural).
 Elles sont arrivé(es) ( you add a e plus a s if the subject is plural and
female.)

If the subject is a group of 10 women and 1 man, you are supposed to act as if
the entire group was male because French grammar considers that male
always wins.
There is, however, a growing number of people who refuse to follow (and
even teach) this rule they consider sexist.

Passé composé agreement of verbs using avoir as a helping verb

Verbs using avoir in the passé composé only need to agree with
preceding direct objects.
A simple way to know whether a verb has a preceding direct object is to ask
what? after the verb.

La tarte qu’elle a mangée était excellente.

The tart she ate was excellent.

Here you can say, she ate what? The tart. Since tart comes before the verb
and is female, you need to agree in number and add a “e” to mangé.

If this all sounds complicated don’t worry.

While it takes a while to get used to all these new conjugations, mistakes will
rarely prevent you from being understood. In fact, the French regularly make
mistakes when they use the passé composé.

Learn to conjugate avoir and être, focus on learning the most common
patterns and you will be able to correctly conjugate verbs in the passé
composé in the majority of cases.