Present Perfect

The Present Perfect is formed with have/has and the past participle of a verb:

I have worked at this company since I was eighteen years old.

He has broken his leg.

Simple Present: I study English.

Simple Past: I studied English.

Present Perfect: I have studied English.

Use the Present Perfect:

for something that started in the past and continues in the present:

I have studied English since 2015.

She hasn’t eaten her food yet.

To talk about an experience up to the present:

Have you watched this movie?

For a series of actions before now.

She has ridden her bike lots of times.

Pay attention!

Use the auxiliary has for He, She, It.

Use the auxiliary have for I, You, We, They.

AFFIRMATIVE	NEGATIVE	INTERROGATIVE
I have played	I haven’t played	Have I played?
You have played	You haven’t played	Have you played?
He has played	He hasn’t played	Has he played?
She has played	She hasn’t played	Has she played?
It has played	It hasn’t played	Has it played?
We have played	We haven’t played	Have we played?
You have played	You haven’t played	Have you played?
They have played	They haven’t played	Have they played?

In the Present Perfect, the main verb is always going to be in the Past Participle for questions, affirmative and negative sentences.

To make the past tense of regular verbs, the ending -ed is added to the infinitive.

Examples:

She has worked at that company for a long time.

They have loved each other since they were kids.

We haven’t talked for five years.

Some of the verbs are irregular, which means they don’t follow an established pattern. In the Present Perfect always use the Past Participle form. Here are the forms of the most common irregular verbs:

IRREGULAR VERBS

Infinitive	Simple Past	Past Participle
to arise	arose	arisen
to awake	awoke	awoken
to be	was, were	been
to bear	bore	born
to beat	beat	beaten
to become	became	become
to begin	began	begun
to bet	bet	bet
to bite	bit	bitten
to bleed	bled	bled
to blow	blew	blown
to break	broke	broken
to bring	brought	brought
to build	built	built
to burn	burnt (burned)	burnt (burned)
to buy	bought	bought
to catch	caught	caught
to choose	chose	chosen
to come	came	come
to cost	cost	cost
to cut	cut	cut
to dig	dug	dug
to do	did	done
to draw	drew	drawn
to drink	drank	drunk
to drive	drove	driven
to eat	ate	eaten
to fall	fell	fallen
to feed	fed	fed
to feel	felt	felt
to fight	fought	fought
to find	found	found
to fly	flew	flown
to forbid	forbade	forbidden
to forget	forgot	forgotten
to forgive	forgave	forgiven
to forsake	forsook	forsaken
to freeze	froze	frozen
to get	got	got / gotten
to give	gave	given
to go	went	gone
to grow	grew	grown
to have	had	had
to hear	heard	heard
to hide	hid	hid / hidden
to hit	hit	hit
to hold	held	held
to hurt	hurt	hurt
to keep	kept	kept
to know	knew	known
to lead	led	led
to lend	lent	lent
to lose	lost	lost
to make	made	made
to meet	met	met
to pay	paid	paid
to put	put	put
to read	read	read
to ride	rode	ridden
to ring	rang	rung
to rise	rose	risen
to run	ran	run
to say	said	said
to see	saw	seen
to sell	sold	sold
to send	sent	sent
to shut	shut	shut
to sleep	slept	slept
to speak	spoke	spoken
to swim	swam	swum
to take	took	taken
to teach	taught	taught
to tell	told	told
to think	thought	thought
to throw	threw	thrown
to win	won	won
to write	wrote	written

Examples:

Andrew has been in New York since winter.

I have written many emails to you.

Some time phrases used with the Present Perfect are:

Already, Yet, Since, For, Lately, Still, Before, Ever, Never