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
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
It is easy to find the answer from the options (a,b,c) you gave, that is, the answers are not close to each other.
Good morning Sir,
I have a doubt about the meaning of two sentences:
The meaning is almost the same even if there’s a slight difference, is it correct?
Also, I don’t understand if I can say:
Are both the phrases corrected? Or I have to use is being finished and was being finished?
Hello Libra23,
'finish' is what is sometimes called an ergative verb. This means it can be used both transitively and intransitively (look for the 'Verb patterns' section on this second page).
In sentence 1 'will finish' is intransitive, and in sentence 2 it is transitive (and in the passive voice). In most contexts, they effectively mean the same thing, though 2 includes the idea of people or machines doing the work more than 1 does.
Does that help you make sense of it?
Best wishes,
Kirk
LearnEnglish team
Thanks a lot Kirk
Sir,
This is the ssentence that appears in a mmagazine which is rrenowned all over the world:
The dope was disappeared by the local roden population.
Can we say, sir, 'was disappeared'?
I think 'disappear' doesn't take object, and so can not be used in passive voice.
But the mmagazine is well kdown for iis quality articles and chaste english.
What do you say sir?
Regards
Dipak R Gandhi
Hi dipakrgandhi,
In its most common usage, you are right that "disappear" does not take an object.
However, "disappear" does have another usage, with an object. Here are some examples.
This transitive usage is much less common.
Jonathan
LearnEnglish team
Thanks Jonathan, yes, sadly in the 1970s the use of "was disappeared by ..." applied in military dictatorships in Latin America.
Firstly, it is my understanding that when we use the past participle in this way, it is no longer the past participle but the 'passive verb'. The past participle always follows a form of the verb 'to have', but the passive verb always follows a form of the verb 'to be'.
Secondly, question 7 (on the second grammar test) is not an example of the passive voice.
"Someone saw my talk at the conference and recommended me as a speaker."
This sentence uses the the verb 'to do' in it's past form (did). It's hidden in the conjugation. If we un-conjugate the verbs in the sentence, it reads:
"Someone did see my talk at the conference and did recommend me as a speaker."
Therefore, this sentence is in past simple tense. In order for it to be in the passive voice, it needs to use a form of the verb 'to be' and a 'passive verb'.
Hello Kieronimo,
That's an interesting point about the term 'past participle'. Since the resources on our website are for learners, we've used the most common terminology.
Thanks also for your observation about question 7. We included a non-passive form as a kind of challenge, but can see how this could be confusing. We'll consider changing this.
Best wishes,
Kirk
LearnEnglish team
Hi,
i have a question about a sentence that i came across.
"8 year old me was convinced that she was Indian".
is the word "convinced"here used in the passive form or is it an adjective. how can i distinguish this easily.
with sentences like the door was painted or the cookies were made by him, the passives here looks very obvious to me but in the sentence above i had a little confusion. i hope you can help me out