Passive voice
A ‘passive’ sentence means that the thing doing the action is the object of the sentence.
The students are taught by the professor
Subject receiving the action passive verb doing the action
His/The car is cleaned by Rob
Subject receiving the action passive verb doing the act
(Thing receiving the action + be + past participle + by + thing doing the action)
Compare this to active voice where the thing doing the action is the subject of the sentence.
The professor teaches students
The subject verb object
Rob cleans his car
The subject verb object
When do we use the passive voice?
There are three main reasons why we use the passive voice:
-
When we do not know who did an action. (The window was broken.)
-
It is not important who does an action. (Breakfast will be served by 7am.)
-
Sometimes using the passive can be more polite. (A mistake was made by Rob. Not, Rob made a mistake. The focus is on the mistake and not the person who made it.)
|
Tense |
Active |
Passive |
|
Simple present |
Once a week Tom cleans the house |
Once a week the house is cleaned by Tom |
|
Present continuous |
Sarah is writing a letter |
A letter is being written by Sarah |
|
Simple past
|
Sam repaired the car |
The car was repaired by Sam |
|
Past continuous |
The salesman was helping the customer |
The customer was being helped by the salesman |
|
Present perfect |
Many tourists have visited that castle |
That castle has been visited by many tourists |
|
Past perfect |
John had repaired his motorcycle |
The motorcycle had been repaired by John |
|
Present perfect continuous |
Recently, Henry has been doing the work |
Recently, the work has been done by Henry |
|
Past perfect continuous |
The chef had been preparing the meal for 10 hours |
For 10 hours the meal had been prepared by the chef |
|
Simple future (will) |
Someone will finish the work by 5pm. |
The work will be finished by someone by 5pm |
|
Simple future (be going to) |
Sally is going to make a wonderful dinner tonight |
A beautiful dinner is going to be made by Sally tonight |
|
Used to |
William used to pay the bills |
The bills used to be paid by William |
|
Would always |
My mother would always make soup on Saturday. |
Soup would always be made by my mother on Saturday. |
