Questions in Passive

How do we form questions in Passive voice?

Questions in Passive are formed with to be and the past participle *.

1. Questions without questions words in Passive (Simple Present)

Form of be	Subject	past participle	Complement	Yes/No	Subject	Auxiliary (+ n't)
Is	the test	written	in room 311?	Yes, No, No,	it it it	is. is not. isn't.
Are	grapes	grown	in California?	Yes, No, No,	they they they	are. are not. aren't.

2. Questions with questions words in Passive (Simple Present)

Question word	Form of be	Subject	past participle	Complement	Answer
Where	is	the test	written?		The test is written in room 311.
Why	are	grapes	grown	in California?	Grapes are grown in California because it's warm and sunny.

3. Questions without questions words in Passive (Simple Past)

Form of be	Subject	past participle	Complement	Yes/No	Subject	Auxiliary (+ n't)
Was	the book	taken	to the classroom?	Yes, No, No,	it it it	was. was not. wasn't.
Were	the students	taught	at home?	Yes, No, No,	they they they	were. were not. weren't.

4. Questions with question words in Passive (Simple Past)

Question word	Form of be	Subject	past participle	Complement	Answer
Where	was	the book	taken?		The book was taken to the classroom.
Why	were	the students	taught	at home?	The students were taught at home because the school was closed.

5. Other tenses

Here are some more examples in other tenses. Let's start with the simple forms:

Tense	Auxiliary	Subject	Verb
Present Perfect	Has	the house	been built?
Past Perfect	Had	the house	been built?
will-future	Will	the house	be built?
going to-future	Is	the house	going to be built?
Future Perfect	Will	the house	have been built?
Conditional	Would	the house	be built?
Conditional Perfect	Would	the house	have been built?

And here are two progessive forms:

Tense	Auxiliary	Subject	Verb
Present Progressive	Is	the house	being built?
Past Progressive	Was	the house	being built?

* past participle:

• regular verbs → infinitive + -ed
• irregular verbs → 3rd column of the table of the irregular verbs