Tenses are type of verbs that indicates when an event happened, is happening or will happen. Tenses are used to indicate when an action takes place - present, past or future.
It's one of the most essential skills to master to become proficient in communicating in English language, both verbally and in written form.
The English language has three tenses broadly - Past tense, Present tense, and Future tense.
- Past tense refers to things/ activities that have happened in the past or have a past state of being.
- Present tense refers to the current time i.e. activity is currently happening or has a state that's general or currently exists
- Future tense refers to things that/ activities that haven't happened so far or are expected to happen
These 3 tenses further have 4 forms namely: Simple, Continuous, Perfect, Perfect continuous, making it in total 12 tenses in English language namely:
- Simple Past
- Past continuous
- Past Perfect
- Past Perfect continuous
- Simple Present
- Present continuous
- Present Perfect
- Present Perfect Continuous
- Simple Future
- Future continuous
- Future perfect
- Future perfect continuous
