When to use which Tense? This is often asked by the learners and remain often confused until they learn the situations to use them.
| Tense | Function | Example |
| Present simple | used for facts, generalizations, and truths that are not affected by the passage of time | “She writes a lot of papers for her classes.” |
| Past simple | used for events completed in the past | “She wrote the papers for all of her classes last month.” |
| Future simple | used for events to be completed in the future | “She will write papers for her classes next semester.” |
| Present perfect | used to describe events that began in the past and are expected to continue, or to emphasize the relevance of past events to the present moment | “She has written papers for most of her classes, but she still has some papers left to write.” |
| Past perfect | used to describe events that happened prior to other events in the past | “She had written several papers for her classes before she switched universities.” |
| Future perfect | used to describe events that will be completed between now and a specific point in the future | “She will have written many papers for her classes by the end of the semester.” |
| Present continuous | used to describe currently ongoing (usually temporary) actions | “She is writing a paper for her class.” |
| Past continuous | used to describe ongoing past events, often in relation to the occurrence of another event | “She was writing a paper for her class when her pencil broke.” |
| Future continuous | used to describe future events that are expected to continue over a period of time | “She will be writing a lot of papers for her classes next year.” |
| Present perfect continuous | used to describe events that started in the past and continue into the present or were recently completed, emphasizing their relevance to the present moment | “She has been writing a paper all night, and now she needs to get some sleep.” |
| Past perfect continuous | used to describe events that began, continued, and ended in the past, emphasizing their relevance to a past moment | “She had been writing a paper all night, and she needed to get some sleep.” |
| Future perfect continuous | used to describe events that will continue up until a point in the future, emphasizing their expected duration | “She will have been writing this paper for three months when she hands it in.” |