How to make negative questions in English
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With normal yes / no questions, we put the auxiliary verb at the start.
- Do you want coffee?
- Have you done your homework?
When we ask negative questions, we need to include 'not' (or, more usually, 'n't'). We can use them to show that we are surprised by something, and we want to check that it's true.
- Don't you want coffee? (= I'm surprised that you don't want coffee, so I'm checking that you really don't want any.)
- Haven't you done your homework? (= I'm surprised that you maybe haven't done it.)
Negative questions are easy to make. You just add 'n't' after the auxiliary verb at the beginning of the question. We can make them in any tense.
| Present simple with 'be': | Isn't she from Brazil? | Aren't they at home? |
| Present simple with other verbs: | Don't they live in Canada? | Doesn't she speak Spanish? |
| Present continuous: | Isn't he coming with us? | Aren't you working tonight? |
| Past simple: | Didn't you go out last night? | Didn't she go to work this morning? |
| Past simple with 'be': | Wasn't she at home this morning? | Weren't they at school today? |
| Past continuous: | Wasn't she working when you saw her? | Weren't they staying in a hotel? |
| Present perfect: | Haven't you done your homework? | Hasn't she already had lunch? |
| Present perfect continuous: | Hasn't she been sleeping? | Haven't the children been playing outside? |
| Past perfect: | Hadn't he gone to the doctor? | Hadn't Lucy brought her passport? |
| Past perfect continuous: | Hadn't you been studying? | Hadn't she been cooking? |
| Future simple with 'will': | Won't you help me? | Won't they arrive early? |
| Future simple with 'going to': | Aren't you going to come with us? | Isn't he going to meet Julie later? |
| Future continuous: | Won't they be sleeping at 3am? | Won't you be driving to the meeting? |
| Future perfect: | Won't you have finished everything by then? | Won't he have left by dinnertime? |
| Future perfect continuous: | Won't she have been travelling for ages? | Won't we have been working all day? |
Click here for an exercise about negative questions.
Click here for another exercise about negative questions.
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