Verbs, in English Grammar, have five properties: tense, person, mood, voice and number and in this article, we will be focusing on voice. In grammar, there are two voices: Active and Passive.

A sentence normally includes the subject, the verb and an object.

Therefore, when a subject acts upon a verb in a sentence or performs the verbs action, it is said to be in Active voice.  The sentences in active voice are often characterized with a strong, direct and clear tone.

For example:

Ram is writing a letter.

Navya painted the entire fence.

Vandana will give you instructions.

While, when the Subject is on the receiving end of the verb’s action, it is known as Passive voice. Passive voice, often, is constructed as the verb’s past tense. 

For example:

A letter is being written by Ram.

The entire fence was painted by Navya.

Instructions will be given to you by Vandana

In our examples, Subject is in bold, verb is italic and object is underlined.

So, how do we change active voice to passive voice?

Step 1: Write the active sentences object as the passive sentence’s subject.

For example: Active: Ram is writing a letter

                       Passive: A letter ……..

Here, the object “a letter” changes to the subject “A letter” and starts the passive sentence.

 

Step 2: Write the Subject of the active sentence as the object of the passive sentence beginning with the preposition ‘by’.

For example: Active: Ram is writing a letter

...Passive: A letter …….by Ram.

 

Step 3: Write the past tense of the verb used in an active sentence as a passive sentence’s verb.

For example: Active: Ram is writing a letter

                       Passive: A letter is being written by Ram.

 

Let’s have a look on how we change from Passive voice to Active voice.

 

Step 1: Write the passive sentence’s subject as the active sentence’s object.

For example: Passive: A letter is being written by Ram

                       Active:   ……………. A letter

 

Step 2: Write the passive sentence’s object as the active sentence’s subject

For example: Passive: A letter is being written by Ram.

                       Active: Ram is …….. a letter.

 

Step 3: Write the present tense of the verb used in passive sentence as active sentence’s verb

For example: Passive: A letter is being written by Ram

                       Active: Ram is writing a letter.

Some more examples on Active and Passive based on different types of tense:-

 

Tense		Subject	Verb	Object
Simple Present	Active	Ram	writes	a letter
	Passive	A letter	is written	by Ram
Simple Past	Active	Ram	wrote	a letter
	Passive	A letter	was written	by Ram
Present prefect	Active	Ram	has written	a letter
	Passive	A letter	has been written	by Ram
Future	Active	Ram	will write	a letter
	Passive	A letter	will be written	by Ram
Past perfect	Active	Ram	had written	a letter
	Passive	A letter	had been written	by Ram
Present continuous	Active	Ram	is writing	a letter
	Passive	A letter	is being written	by Ram

More often than not, while speaking or even while writing, we tend to switch between Active & Passive voice a number of times. However, due to such a habit we may end up framing sentences which are grammatically incorrect or even confuse our audience. Having a knowledge about both the voices, their structures and their uses will help us avoid making such common errors