Free practice · Passé composé · A1 to B1
Passé Composé Practice: 10 Free Questions
Ten passé composé questions, free and playable right here. You type the whole form, auxiliary included, it is corrected the moment you answer, and anything you get wrong comes back before the round ends. Below the drill, the full passé composé of the same ten verbs: parler, être, avoir, aller, finir, prendre, faire, pouvoir, attendre and vouloir.
Try it · passé composé
1 / 10
Tu trop vite !
parler · to speak
Accents are not marked here, so êtes and etes both count. Ten questions, passé composé only. The full drill runs six tenses over 300 verbs, offline, in one file.
When ten questions stop being enough
The same drill, with 300 verbs instead of ten and six tenses instead of one. It keeps a record of the verbs that catch you out and hands them back more often, which is what turns practice into progress.
- 300 verbs, 6 tenses, over 12,600 questions
- A timer mode, for when you need the answer to come without thinking
- One file you download and keep, opening with no connection
The passé composé of the ten verbs, in full
Every form the drill can ask you for. Read it after the round rather than before: looking up the answer you just missed is what makes it stay.
| Verb | je | tu | il | nous | vous | ils |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| parlerto speakRegular | ai parlé | as parlé | a parlé | avons parlé | avez parlé | ont parlé |
| êtreto beIrregular | ai été | as été | a été | avons été | avez été | ont été |
| avoirto haveIrregular | ai eu | as eu | a eu | avons eu | avez eu | ont eu |
| allerto goIrregular | suis allé / suis allée | es allé / es allée | est allé | sommes allés / sommes allées | êtes allés / êtes allées | sont allés / sont allées |
| finirto finishRegular | ai fini | as fini | a fini | avons fini | avez fini | ont fini |
| prendreto takeIrregular | ai pris | as pris | a pris | avons pris | avez pris | ont pris |
| faireto do / to makeIrregular | ai fait | as fait | a fait | avons fait | avez fait | ont fait |
| pouvoircan / to be able toIrregular | ai pu | as pu | a pu | avons pu | avez pu | ont pu |
| attendreto waitRegular | ai attendu | as attendu | a attendu | avons attendu | avez attendu | ont attendu |
| vouloirto wantIrregular | ai voulu | as voulu | a voulu | avons voulu | avez voulu | ont voulu |
The auxiliary is the question, not the participle
The passé composé is built from two pieces: avoir or être in the présent, followed by the past participle. Most French verbs take avoir. A closed set takes être, and when they do, the participle agrees with the subject the way an adjective would.
Among the ten verbs in this round, aller is the only one that takes être. That is why "Nous sommes allés à la plage" is the single answer here where an ending moves with the subject, and why every other answer leaves the participle alone, whoever is speaking.
Both agreements count as right
For the aller question the drill accepts "sommes allés" and "sommes allées". Neither is more correct than the other without knowing who nous is, so marking one of them wrong would be teaching a rule that does not exist. The paid drill accepts both for the same reason.
Accents and apostrophes are not marked either. What is being tested is the auxiliary and the participle, not your keyboard.
Five participles that have to be learned, not worked out
Regular verbs give their participle away: parler gives parlé, finir gives fini, attendre gives attendu. Three groups, three endings, no surprises.
The rest are learned one at a time, and this round holds five of the most used: pris for prendre, fait for faire, pu for pouvoir, voulu for vouloir, été for être. Nothing in the infinitive predicts them, which is why they come back at you until they stop costing marks.
The same ten verbs, another tense
- PrésentWhere the marks start going. Ten questions.
- Passé composéYou are here. Avoir or être, then the participle. Ten questions.
- ImparfaitOne stem, one set of endings, one exception.
- Futur simpleEndings you already know, stems you may not.
Questions
- Is this passé composé practice really free?
- Yes. The ten questions run in your browser, you type the answers and they are corrected straight away, with no account and no email address. The paid drill exists for the other 290 verbs and the other five tenses, not to unlock this page.
- Do I type the auxiliary too?
- Yes, the whole form. For "Tu ___ trop vite !" the answer is "as parlé", not "parlé" on its own. The auxiliary is the part most learners get wrong, so leaving it out would drill the easy half.
- Which verbs take être in the passé composé?
- A closed set, learned once: aller, venir, arriver, partir, entrer, sortir, monter, descendre, rester, tomber, naître, mourir, passer, retourner and their compounds, plus every reflexive verb. Aller is the one that appears in this round.
- What is in the paid drill that is not here?
- 300 verbs instead of ten, six tenses instead of one, over 12,600 questions, a timer mode and a progress record that remembers which verbs keep catching you out. It is one file you download and keep, and it opens with no connection.