Past Perfect Continuous · Exercises
B1Intermediate practice
How long had…?, causes (she’d been crying) and spelling.
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
- B1 Boss12 hits before you lose 3 lives
- Irregular MatchPair verbs with their past forms — 60 seconds
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What you’ll practise at B1
- had been + -ing
- 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?
- 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.
Ask a question about the highlighted words, starting with “How long”.
Ethan had been training for the marathon for ages when the news came.
Show answer
How long had Ethan been training for the marathon when the news came?
How long + had + subject + been + -ing…? asks about the duration up to a moment in the past.
Complete the explanation.
The woman upstairs was covered in flour because she _____ (bake) bread.
Show answer
The woman upstairs was covered in flour because she had been baking bread.
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.
Complete the explanation.
My niece’s hair was wet because she _____ (swim) in the sea.
Show answer
My niece’s hair was wet because she had been swimming in the sea.
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.
Put the words in order to make a question.
running / park / had / friends / the / my / in / long / been
Show answer
Had my friends been running in the park long?
Questions: Had + subject + been + -ing…?
Is this sentence correct?
My niece had being learning Japanese since the summer before she moved abroad.
Show answer
My niece had been learning Japanese since the summer before she moved abroad.
“being” should be “been”. Past perfect continuous: had been + -ing — an activity that went on for a while before a moment in the past.
Past perfect simple or continuous?
Elena _____ (paint) the fence for half an hour, but she still hadn’t finished.
Show answer
Elena had been painting the fence for half an hour, but she still hadn’t finished.
The job wasn’t finished (“still hadn’t finished”), so use the continuous: had been painting. “Had painted the fence” would mean the job was done.