In this lesson, you'll learn how to talk about things that will have happened, or how to use the future perfect tense.
I can...
Le futur antérieur is a compound tense that uses an auxiliary and a past participle. If you're a bit rusty about le passé composé, skip ahead to the next lesson and then come back here!.
Just like le passé composé, most verbs use avoir as the auxiliary verb. But the verbs that take être do make agreement in le futur antérieur.
You conjugate your auxiliary verb in the simple future (see this lesson to review how).
To conjugate avoir in le futur, follow this pattern:
| Singular | Plural | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Subjects | Conjugations | Subjects | Conjugations |
| j' | aurai | nous | aurons |
| tu | auras | vous | aurez |
| il / elle / on | aura | ils / elles | auront |
To conjugate être in le futur, follow this pattern:
| Singular | Plural | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Subjects | Conjugations | Subjects | Conjugations |
| je | serai | nous | serons |
| tu | seras | vous | serez |
| il / elle / on | sera | ils / elles | seront |
This tense is used to describe things that will have happened.
For instance, by the time I finish college, I will have finished my resumé and will have applied to jobs.
Watch this video, from Learn French with Vincent, to help you through the tense:
This video, from Learn French with Pascal, does a great job of comparing the future perfect in English and French:
See Tex's French Grammar for a lesson and exercises.
See Lingolia for a lesson and exercises (pull downs and fill in the blank).