English sentences can describe the same event from different points of view.
Sometimes we want to focus on the person or thing doing an action.
At other times we want to focus on the person or thing receiving the action.
This is the main difference between active and passive voice.
What is active voice?
In active voice, the subject performs the action.
For example:
The chef prepared the meal.
The subject is the chef.
The action is prepared.
The object receiving the action is the meal.
The sentence follows a common pattern:
subject + action + object
What is passive voice?
In passive voice, the person or thing receiving the action becomes the grammatical subject.
Compare:
The chef prepared the meal.
with:
The meal was prepared by the chef.
The event is the same.
The focus has changed.
The active sentence focuses first on the chef.
The passive sentence focuses first on the meal.
How is the passive formed?
A common passive structure uses:
a form of be + past participle
For example:
The window was broken.
Was is a form of the verb be.
Broken is the past participle of break.
The form of be changes with the tense
The passive can appear in different tenses.
Present simple
Active:
Workers clean the building every morning.
Passive:
The building is cleaned every morning.
Past simple
Active:
The team completed the project yesterday.
Passive:
The project was completed yesterday.
Future
Active:
The school will announce the results tomorrow.
Passive:
The results will be announced tomorrow.
Present perfect
Active:
The technician has repaired the computer.
Passive:
The computer has been repaired.
The past participle stays important
When making a passive sentence, use the correct past participle form of the main verb.
For regular verbs, the past participle often ends in ed.
For example:
- cleaned
- finished
- painted
- opened
Irregular verbs have forms that need to be learned.
Examples include:
- write becomes written
- break becomes broken
- take becomes taken
- make becomes made
- choose becomes chosen
What happens to the object?
To understand the change from active to passive, first find the object in the active sentence.
Active:
The students completed the experiment.
The object is:
the experiment
In the passive version, that object moves into the subject position:
The experiment was completed by the students.
A practical conversion method
When changing a straightforward active sentence into passive voice, try this process:
- Find the subject.
- Find the verb.
- Find the object receiving the action.
- Move the object to the beginning.
- Use the correct form of be.
- Use the past participle of the main verb.
- Add the original subject with by only if it is useful.
Example conversion
Start with:
The mechanic repaired the bicycle.
Subject:
the mechanic
Verb:
repaired
Object:
the bicycle
Move the object to the beginning:
The bicycle...
Add the correct form of be and the past participle:
The bicycle was repaired...
Add the actor if it matters:
The bicycle was repaired by the mechanic.
The by phrase is optional
A passive sentence does not always need to name the person or thing doing the action.
For example:
My bicycle was stolen last night.
The speaker may not know who stole it.
Writing:
My bicycle was stolen by someone last night.
usually adds little useful information.
When should you include the actor?
Include the actor when that information matters.
For example:
The novel was written by Mary Shelley.
The writer is important information, so the phrase adds value.
Compare:
The classroom is cleaned every evening.
If the identity of the cleaner does not matter, there may be no reason to add it.
Why use active voice?
Active voice often makes it immediately clear who performs an action.
For example:
The committee approved the plan.
The reader knows exactly who made the decision.
Active voice is often direct and easy to understand.
Active voice can make responsibility clearer
Compare:
The manager changed the schedule.
with:
The schedule was changed.
The passive sentence tells us what happened but does not identify who changed the schedule.
If responsibility matters, the active sentence may be more useful.
Why use passive voice?
Passive voice is useful when the receiver of the action is more important than the person performing it.
For example:
The bridge was completed in 2018.
The important information may be the bridge and its completion rather than the construction team.
Use passive voice when the actor is unknown
For example:
My phone was taken from my bag.
If you do not know who took it, passive voice allows you to describe the event without inventing an actor.
Use passive voice when the actor is obvious
Imagine a hotel guest says:
My room is being cleaned.
There may be no need to say that hotel staff are cleaning it because the situation already makes that obvious.
Use passive voice when the result deserves the focus
Consider a science report:
The temperature was measured every five minutes.
The measurement procedure may be more important than the identity of the person holding the thermometer.
This is one reason passive constructions sometimes appear in scientific and formal writing.
Passive voice is not automatically formal
Passive voice can appear in ordinary everyday English.
For example:
I was invited to the party.
or:
Our flight was cancelled.
These sentences sound completely natural in everyday conversation.
Active voice is not always better
You may hear advice telling writers to avoid passive voice completely.
That rule is too simple.
Consider:
Someone stole my bicycle.
If you do not know who the person was, this sentence uses the vague word someone.
The passive version may be more natural:
My bicycle was stolen.
The best choice depends on what information matters.
Passive voice can change the focus
Compare these sentences:
Alexander Fleming discovered penicillin.
Penicillin was discovered by Alexander Fleming.
The first sentence begins with the scientist.
The second begins with penicillin.
A writer might choose either version depending on the surrounding topic.
Think about what comes before the sentence
Imagine a paragraph is already discussing a new community centre.
The next sentence might say:
The centre was officially opened in June.
This keeps the centre as the topic.
If the paragraph is about the mayor, the writer might prefer:
The mayor officially opened the centre in June.
Voice can help connect a sentence to the surrounding information.
Not every sentence can become passive
Passive voice normally requires an action that affects an object.
Consider:
The child slept.
There is no object receiving the action of slept.
So there is no ordinary passive version such as:
Something was slept by the child.
That sentence does not work.
Look for an object before converting
Active:
The dog chased the ball.
The ball receives the action, so a passive form is possible:
The ball was chased by the dog.
But:
The dog slept.
has no object to move into the subject position.
Common mistake 1: Forgetting the verb be
Incorrect passive:
The letter sent yesterday.
Correct:
The letter was sent yesterday.
Common mistake 2: Using the wrong participle
Incorrect:
The window was broke.
Correct:
The window was broken.
Broken is the past participle required here.
Common mistake 3: Using the wrong form of be
Incorrect:
The reports is checked every Friday.
Correct:
The reports are checked every Friday.
The form of be must agree with the subject.
Common mistake 4: Changing the tense accidentally
Active:
The technician repaired the computer yesterday.
Correct passive:
The computer was repaired yesterday.
Both describe a past event.
This version changes the tense:
The computer is repaired yesterday.
That does not correctly preserve the original time.
Common mistake 5: Adding an unnecessary by phrase
Consider:
English is spoken around the world by people.
The final phrase adds little useful information.
A cleaner version is:
English is spoken around the world.
Common mistake 6: Hiding responsibility when it matters
Consider:
An incorrect figure was entered into the report.
This may be appropriate if the person responsible is unknown or irrelevant.
But if responsibility is important, a clearer sentence might be:
The finance team entered an incorrect figure into the report.
Voice affects what information receives attention.
A useful voice test
Ask:
Who or what performs the action?
If the grammatical subject performs the action, the sentence is usually active.
Ask:
Who or what receives the action?
If the grammatical subject receives the action and the verb uses a passive construction, the sentence is passive.
Example 1
The storm damaged several houses.
The storm performs the action.
This is active voice.
Example 2
Several houses were damaged by the storm.
Several houses receive the action.
This is passive voice.
Example 3
Several houses were damaged.
This is also passive voice even though the actor is not stated.
Try converting active to passive
Active:
The school organized the competition.
Object:
the competition
Passive:
The competition was organized by the school.
Try converting passive to active
Passive:
The final goal was scored by Maya.
Actor:
Maya
Active:
Maya scored the final goal.
What if the passive sentence does not name the actor?
Consider:
The door was damaged during the night.
You cannot create a fully specific active version unless you know who or what caused the damage.
You should not invent information simply to force the sentence into active voice.
Use active voice when the doer matters
Active voice may be preferable when you want to emphasize:
- responsibility
- decision making
- who performed an important action
- a clear sequence of actions
For example:
The rescue team found the missing hikers.
The rescue team is important to the message.
Use passive voice when the receiver matters
Passive voice may be useful when you want to emphasize:
- a result
- a process
- an object being discussed
- an event with an unknown actor
- information where the actor is obvious or unnecessary
For example:
The road was reopened at noon.
The reader may care more about the road being available again than about the workers who reopened it.
Do not choose voice only by sentence length
Sometimes active voice is shorter.
Sometimes passive voice is shorter because the actor can be omitted.
The better question is:
What information should this sentence focus on?
A practical editing checklist
When reviewing a sentence, ask:
- Who or what performs the action?
- Who or what receives the action?
- Is the sentence active or passive?
- Does the current focus match what matters most?
- If the sentence is passive, does the reader need to know the actor?
- If responsibility matters, have I made the actor clear?
- Is the form of be correct?
- Is the past participle correct?
- Have I preserved the intended tense?
The main idea
Active voice places the person or thing performing an action in the subject position.
Passive voice places the person or thing receiving the action in the subject position.
The passive normally uses a form of be plus a past participle.
Active voice is often useful when the actor and responsibility should be clear.
Passive voice is useful when the receiver or result deserves the focus, when the actor is unknown, or when the actor is obvious or unimportant.
Neither voice is automatically correct or incorrect.
Choose the form that communicates the information your reader needs most clearly.
Continue learning
Review The Basic Parts of an English Sentence when you need to identify subjects, verbs and objects before changing sentence voice.