Learn Future Perfect Continuous Tense | Basic English Grammar Course

Hi, everybody.

I’m Esther.

Welcome to the last tense.

If you haven't checked out my earlier videos on the tenses,

please go check them out now.

In this video, I will talk about the future perfect continuous tense.

This tense can be used to describe an ongoing action

or situation that will last for a specified period of time in the future.

There's a lot to learn, so keep watching.

The future perfect continuous tense is used to talk about an ongoing situation

that will be in progress for a period of time at a specific point in time in the future.

Let's take a look at some examples.

The first sentence says,

‘She will have been living in Ireland for 10 years at that point.’

So no matter what the subject, in this case we have ‘she’,

we follow with ‘will have been’ and then ‘verb +ing’.

So, ‘She will have been living in Ireland …’

Then this sentence has the duration.

What period of time will this last? ‘for 10 years’

And when?

Remember, we need a point in time in the future.

In this case, we just use a general expression, ‘at that point’.

Here, it's not specific and that's okay.

We'll see some specific examples in the next sentence.

‘By midnight, he will have been sleeping for four hours.’

Here, the specific time in the future comes at the beginning of the sentence.

‘By midnight’ And, again, we see ‘will have been’ + verb 'ing'.

‘By midnight, he will have been sleeping for four hours.’.

Here we have ‘for four hours’.

This shows the duration or how long this action will be in progress.

So, again, ‘By midnight he will have been sleeping for four hours.’

The last sentence says, ‘In June …’

Here, again, we have the specific time in the future at the beginning of the sentence.

‘In June, ‘we’ that's the subject.

‘we'll have been studying …’ There's the ‘verb +ing’.

‘… at this university for four years.’

Here is the duration, ‘for four years’.

Good job.

And let's move on.

Now, let's look at the negative form of the future perfect continuous tense.

In the affirmative form, we say ‘subject’ + ‘will have been’ and then ‘verb +ing’.

In the negative form, however, we say, ‘subject’ + ‘will not have been’

and then ‘verb +ing’.

Let's take a look at some examples.

The first sentence here says,

‘At that point, I will not have been living in Spain for 10 years.’

And so you see it.

‘I’ is the subject.

‘… will not have been’ and then ‘verb +ing’.

In this case, ‘living’.

The next sentence says,

‘He will not have been sleeping for four hours by midnight.’

Again, we see the ‘subject’ + ‘will not have been’ and then ‘verb +ing’,

‘sleeping’.

The last sentence says,

‘By then, we will not have been studying at this university for three years.’

Again, we see the ‘subject’ + ‘we will not have been’ and then ‘verb +ing’

here, ‘studying’.

Let's move on.

Now let's take a look at how to form questions in the future perfect continuous tense.

Here, the sentence says,

‘Sean will have been playing soccer for a year by December.’

To turn this into a question, all we have to do is switch the order of the first two words.

So instead of ‘Sean will’, I can say ‘Will Sean’.

‘Will Sean have been playing soccer for a year by December?’

You'll notice that the rest of the sentence stays the same.

I can answer by saying, ‘Yes, he will have.’

or ‘No, he will have not.’

The next sentence says,

‘They will have been working there for three months by that time.’

Again, I changed the order of the first two words.

To turn this into a question ‘They will’ becomes ‘Will they’.

‘Will they have been working there for three months by that time?’

Again, the rest of the sentence stays the same.

I can answer by saying, ‘Yes, they will have.’

or ‘No, they will have not.’

Let's move on.

Now let's take a look at how to form ‘WH” questions in the future perfect continuous tense.

Take a look at the board.

All of these questions begin with a ‘WH’ word.

‘where’ ‘what’

‘who’ and ‘how long’

Take a look at the first question.

‘Where will you have been walking?’

To form a ‘WH’ question, we start with the ‘WH’ word, then ‘will’.

After that, we add the subject, ‘you’, ‘they’, ‘she’ and ‘you’.

After that, we add ‘have been’ + ‘verb +ing’.

‘Where will you have been walking?’

‘What will they have been playing?’

‘Who will she have been talking to?’

and ‘How long will you have been working …?’

There's the ‘verb +ing’.

‘ … there by the time you finish?’

So let's go through one more time and I'll show you how to answer these questions.

‘Where will you have been walking?’

I can answer by saying, ‘I will have been walking in the park.’

‘What will they have been playing?’

‘They will have been playing video games.’

‘Who will she have been talking to?’

‘She will have been talking to her cousin.’

And finally,

‘How long will you have been working there by the time you finish?’

‘By the time I finish, I will have been working there for five years.’

Let's move on.

Congratulations!

You have learned all 12 main English tenses.

It's now time to keep practicing them in your reading and your writing.

I hope to see you in my next videos.

Bye.