The French Passive Voice
Most of the time French sentences are active: a subject does something to an object. Les ouvriers ont construit les maisons - the workers built the houses. The passive flips that round so the thing acted upon becomes the subject: les maisons ont été construites - the houses were built. The action is the same; the spotlight has moved.
English loves the passive and uses it constantly, often to avoid naming who did something. French knows the construction but treats it with suspicion, and it has two favourite ways of avoiding it. So this page has two jobs: first, how to build the passive when you genuinely want it; second, and just as important, the structures French reaches for instead.
How the passive is built: être + past participle
The French passive is the verb plus a past participle, and the participle agrees with the subject in gender and number, exactly like an adjective. This is the single most important point: the participle behaves like an adjective hung off , so it must agree.
- . (The letter is written.)
- construite. (The house is built.)
- . (The letters are written.) - feminine plural, so .
- construites. (The houses are built.) - feminine plural, so construites.
Note the agreement working: for a feminine singular subject, for a feminine plural, construites for les maisons. A masculine plural subject would take -s alone: les livres sont vendus (the books are sold).
The tense lives in être, not the participle
To change the tense of a passive, you change the tense of and leave the participle alone. This is where learners wobble, because the participle of the main verb sits next to a second participle () in the compound tenses. Work through one verb across the tenses:
| Tense | French passive | English |
|---|---|---|
| Present | la lettre écrite | the letter is written |
| Perfect | la lettre a écrite | the letter has been written |
| Imperfect | la lettre écrite | the letter was being written |
| Future | la lettre écrite | the letter will be written |
| Conditional | la lettre écrite | the letter would be written |
In the perfect, a has two participles: (from être, invariable here) and (agreeing with la lettre). The plural is - for the plural auxiliary, for the agreement. Get both right and the rest follows.
- construites 1900. (The houses were built in 1900.)
- l' . (The bridge will be finished next year.)
- vendus enchères. (These paintings would be sold at auction.)
The agent: par, and de for emotion and description
If you want to name who does the action - the agent - you bring them in with (by):
- a . (The letter was written by Marie.)
- a police. (The thief was arrested by the police.)
- construites . (These houses were built by a large company.)
There is an exception worth knowing. After verbs of emotion, attitude or description - states rather than physical actions - the agent comes in with , not :
- . (He is respected by everyone.)
- . (She is loved by her pupils.)
- . (The summit was covered with snow.)
- région . (This region is known to everyone.)
The rough rule: a one-off physical action takes (arrêté par la police); a continuous state of feeling or appearance takes (respecté de tous, couvert de neige).
French prefers on: the everyday alternative
Here is the cultural difference. English happily writes French is spoken here or my bag was stolen with no agent, because the passive is the natural way to hide an unknown or unimportant doer. French finds the full passive heavy and reaches instead for on - a vague subject meaning "one / people / they / someone" - with an active verb:
- On . (French is spoken here.) - literally "one speaks French here".
- On m'a . (My bag was stolen.) - literally "someone stole my bag from me".
- On a . (The shop has been closed.)
- On construit région. (Many houses are being built in this region.)
Whenever the English passive has no agent, or an agent you would only introduce with a vague "by someone", on + active verb is almost always the better French. Reserve the true être passive for when you genuinely want to name the agent with , or for a formal, written register.
The pronominal passive: ça ne se dit pas
French has a second dodge: the pronominal (reflexive) passive, where a normally active verb is made reflexive with and given a passive sense. It works best with things, customs and general truths:
- . (That isn't said. / You don't say that.)
- à température ambiante. (Red wine is served at room temperature.)
- . (White wine is served chilled.)
- . (This book sells very well. / is sold very well.)
- pays. (French is spoken in many countries.)
The verb still agrees with its grammatical subject (ces livres se vendent bien), but no agent is ever named - that is the whole point. The pronominal passive is the natural French for general statements about how things are done.
The trap: English passives built on an indirect object
This is the rule that catches everyone, so hold it carefully. French can only turn the direct object of a verb into a passive subject. It can never promote an indirect object.
Take donner quelque chose à quelqu'un (to give something to someone). The direct object is quelque chose; the person is the indirect object (à quelqu'un). English cheerfully makes the person the subject:
- I was given a book.
- She was told the news.
- We were asked to wait.
French cannot do this. There is no way to say "je sais été donné un livre". The book can become a passive subject (un livre m'a été donné, rather formal), but I / she / we cannot, because they are the indirect object. The everyday solution is on:
- On m'a . (I was given a book.)
- On a . (She was told the news.)
- On a d'. (We were asked to wait.)
If your English passive starts with a person who received the action, do not even try to build a French passive. Switch straight to on + active verb.
Worked examples
- a . (The car was repaired yesterday.) - perfect passive, agrees with la voiture.
- . (The windows were broken during the storm.) - feminine plural, .
- a traduit . (This novel has been translated into twenty languages.) - masculine singular, traduit, no extra ending.
- président . (The president is respected by everyone.) - state of feeling, agent with .
- On a concert. (The concert was cancelled.) - on preferred over a full passive, no agent.
- . (This dish is eaten cold.) - pronominal passive, a general custom.
- On m'a . (I was given flowers.) - indirect-object passive in English, so on in French.
Common mistakes English speakers make
The first and biggest error is forgetting the agreement: it is a , not "la lettre a été écrit" - the participle is an adjective hung off and must match the subject. The second is putting the tense on the wrong word: the tense lives in (sera écrite, était écrite), never in the main participle. The third is over-using the passive because it feels natural in English - where English drops the agent, French almost always prefers on, so prefer on parle français ici over a literal le français est parlé ici in speech. The fourth, and the one that catches even strong learners, is trying to make an indirect object the subject: "I was given a book" cannot become a French passive, so you must say on m'a . Finally, watch the agent preposition: physical actions take (arrêté par la police) but verbs of feeling and description take (aimé de tous, couvert de neige).
See also
- The passé composé page covers past-participle agreement with être in the compound tenses, the same agreement that drives the passive.
- The present indicative conjugation page covers how être is conjugated across the tenses you build the passive on.
- The intermediate French grammar page sets the passive and the on construction in the wider B1-B2 picture.
- The French grammar cheatsheet covers the whole A1-B2 grammar map at a glance.