The passé composé in French : complete course

This course explains the passé composé, the most common past tense in French, used for completed actions in the past and comparable to English forms such as “I ate” or “I have eaten”. You will learn how it is built from an auxiliary verb and a past participle, how to choose between avoir and être, including the DR. & MRS. VANDERTRAMP verbs, when the participle agrees, and how reflexive verbs and negative sentences work.

1. What Is the Passé Composé?

The passé composé is the most common past tense in French. It is used to describe actions that happened and were completed in the past. Think of it as the French equivalent of the English simple past (“I ate”) or present perfect (“I have eaten”).

It is called “composé” (compound) because it is made of two parts: a helper verb (called an auxiliary) and a past participle.

2. Simple Examples

• J’ai mangé une pomme. → I ate an apple. / I have eaten an apple.
• Elle est partie. → She left. / She has left.
• Nous avons vu un film. → We watched a film.
• Il est arrivé à midi. → He arrived at noon.

3. The Key Elements of the Passé Composé

The passé composé always has this structure:

Subject	Auxiliary Verb (avoir or être)	Past Participle
Je (I)	ai	mangé (eaten)
Tu (You)	as	parlé (spoken)
Il/Elle (He/She)	a	fini (finished)
Nous (We)	avons	pris (taken)
Vous (You/formal)	avez	lu (read)
Ils/Elles (They)	ont	vu (seen)

3.1 The Auxiliary Verb: Avoir or Être?

Most French verbs use avoir (to have) as their auxiliary verb. However, a specific group of verbs uses être (to be). These are mainly verbs of movement or change of state, as well as all reflexive verbs.

A helpful way to remember the main être verbs is the acronym DR. & MRS. VANDERTRAMP:

• Descendre – to go down
• Revenir – to come back
• Mourir – to die
• Retourner – to return
• Sortir – to go out

Here is the complete list of the sixteen DR. & MRS. VANDERTRAMP verbs with their past participles:

 

Infinitive	Meaning	Past Participle
devenir	to become	devenu
revenir	to come back	revenu
monter	to go up	monté
rester	to stay	resté
sortir	to go out	sorti
venir	to come	venu
aller	to go	allé
naître	to be born	né
descendre	to go down	descendu
entrer	to enter	entré
rentrer	to go back home	rentré
tomber	to fall	tombé
retourner	to return	retourné
arriver	to arrive	arrivé
mourir	to die	mort
partir	to leave	parti

Watch out: some of these verbs (monter, descendre, sortir, rentrer, retourner) use avoir when they are followed by a direct object.

• Elle est sortie. → She went out.
• Elle a sorti la poubelle. → She took out the trash.
• Il est monté. → He went up.
• Il a monté les valises. → He carried the suitcases up.

3.2 Agreement of the Past Participle with Être

When the auxiliary is être, the past participle agrees in gender and number with the subject, just like an adjective. Add -e for feminine and -s for plural.

Subject	Être	Past Participle
Je	suis	allé(e)
Tu	es	allé(e)
Il / Elle	est	allé / allée
Nous	sommes	allé(e)s
Vous	êtes	allé(e)(s)
Ils / Elles	sont	allés / allées

With avoir, the past participle usually does not agree with the subject: Elles ont mangé. → They ate.

3.3 How to Form the Past Participle

Regular verbs follow simple patterns based on their ending:

• -er verbs → -é: parler → parlé
• -ir verbs → -i: finir → fini
• -re verbs → -u: vendre → vendu

Many common verbs have irregular past participles that you should learn by heart:

• avoir → eu; être → été; faire → fait
• prendre → pris; mettre → mis; dire → dit
• voir → vu; lire → lu; boire → bu
• pouvoir → pu; vouloir → voulu; devoir → dû
• écrire → écrit; ouvrir → ouvert

3.4 Reflexive Verbs

Reflexive verbs always use être, and the reflexive pronoun comes before the auxiliary. In simple cases like these, the past participle agrees with the subject:

• Je me suis levé(e) tôt. → I got up early.
• Elle s’est habillée. → She got dressed.
• Nous nous sommes amusé(e)s. → We had fun.

3.5 The Negative Form

To make a passé composé sentence negative, place ne… pas around the auxiliary verb, not around the past participle:

• Je n’ai pas mangé. → I didn’t eat.
• Elle n’est pas partie. → She didn’t leave.
• Ils ne se sont pas levés. → They didn’t get up.

4. Sources

• Bescherelle : conjugaison et grammaire
• Office québécois de la langue française : Vitrine linguistique
• Le Robert : dictionnaire en ligne