Past Perfect Continuous · Exercises
B2Upper intermediate practice
had been doing vs. had done or was doing, reported speech.
Play
- Practice10 exercises at your own pace
- Time Attack60 seconds, as many as you can
- Survival3 lives, harder as you go
- Tense SortDrag sentences into their tense — 60 seconds
- Timelines10 sentences to match to their timelines
- B2 Boss12 hits before you lose 3 lives
- Irregular MatchPair verbs with their past forms — 60 seconds
Want to mix tenses, go endless or pick exercise types? Set up your own session.
What you’ll practise at B2
- Spelling: waiting, running, lying
- Negatives: hadn’t been
- Questions: Had you been…?
- Short answers
- How long had you been…?
- for / since
- Causes: She was tired because she had been running
- had been doing or had done?
- had been doing or was doing?
- Reported speech: said she had been…
- If I hadn’t been driving… (third conditional)
- I wish I hadn’t been…
- Timelines: what the tense means
Need a refresher? Learn the past perfect continuous: rules, tables and audio examples.
Sample exercises
A taste of what’s inside. In practice mode every exercise is freshly generated.
Report what they said.
“We’ve been learning Japanese for a year,” Rosa and Jack said. → Rosa and Jack said they _____ (learn) Japanese for a year.
Show answer
Rosa and Jack said they had been learning Japanese for a year.
In reported speech, “I’ve been doing” usually moves back to “had been doing”.
Find the word that is wrong.
We didn’t been campaigning against the new road when the news came.
Show answer
We hadn’t been campaigning against the new road when the news came.
Negative: hadn’t (had not) been + -ing.
Is this sentence correct?
Ethan had known the truth for months when he finally told us.
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Ethan had known the truth for months when he finally told us.
Yes, it’s correct. “know” is a state verb, so it isn’t used in the continuous: had known, not had been knowing.
Put the words in order to make a question.
their / had / they / doing / homework / been / long
Show answer
Had they been doing their homework long?
Questions: Had + subject + been + -ing…?
Write the verb in the past perfect continuous.
I was sunburnt because I _____ (sit) in the sun.
Show answer
I was sunburnt because I had been sitting in the sun.
Use the past perfect continuous to explain a past situation with the activity that caused it: She was out of breath because she had been running.
Past continuous or past perfect continuous?
A: What was my brother doing when the alarm went off? B: He _____ (dance) in the kitchen.
Show answer
What was my brother doing when the alarm went off? — He was dancing in the kitchen.
No length of time here: B just says what was in progress at that moment, so use the past continuous (was / were + -ing), like the question. With a length of time (for two hours) you would use had been + -ing.