There are four main verb moods (modes de temps) in French: the indicative, the subjunctive, the conditional, and the imperative. In this chapter, we will study the conditional. There are two tenses that use the conditional mood: the present conditional and the past conditional.

In this chapter, we will study the past conditional, its form and its use, and in this part, we will discuss the use of the past conditional. But before we start, we will remind you of the form of the past conditional:

The past conditional is formed with the conditional of the verb avoir or être (depending on the verb used ) and the past participle of the verb.

The past conditional is used in the following situations:

I. When the condition didn’t happen in the past

The condition failed to happen in the past, and it would be impossible to go back to that situation because it already happened.

For example:

Si tu m’avais prévenu plus tôt, j’aurais apporté plus d’assiettes. (mais tu ne l’as pas fait, donc je n’ai pas apporté plus d’assiettes.)
If you had warned me earlier, I would have brought more plates. (but you didn’t, so I didn’t bring more plates.)

Because it’s a past condition, we use the past conditional.

Here are few more examples:

Si vous aviez travaillé plus sérieusement, vous auriez réussi vos examens. (mais vous n’avez pas travaillé sérieusement et donc vous n’avez pas réussi vos examens.)
If you had worked more seriously, you would have passed your tests. (but you didn’t, so you didn’t pass your exams.)

Les fleurs ne se seraient pas fanées, si tu t’en étais occupé.
The flowers would not have faded if you had taken care of them.

Et qu’aurais-tu fait si tu avais été là ?
And what would you have done if you had been here?

II. When we want to report an event or information that happened, but we are not sure if it truly happened. (It is mainly used in news articles)

For example:

Le mauvais temps ces deux derniers jours aurait fait 200 morts.
The bad weather over the last couple of days is said to have caused the deaths of 200 people.

Note the difference between the sentence above and the sentence below:

Le mauvais temps ces deux derniers jours a fait 200 morts.
The bad weather these last couple of days caused the death of 200 people.

The sentence where the past conditional is used suggests that the person who is reporting this information is not sure whether it is accurate or not, whereas in the second sentence where the past tense is used the person reports a fact.

III. To express regret

We use in this case the verb vouloir.

For example:

J’aurais voulu lui parler plus longtemps, mais je n’avais pas le temps.
I would have liked to talk to him a little longer, but I didn’t have time.

Nous aurions voulu l’emmener avec nous, mais sa maman s’y est opposée.
We would have liked to take him with us, but his mother was opposed to that.


IV. To express reproach/blame. We generally use the verbs: pouvoir, devoir, mieux valoir (only with the personal pronoun “il”), followed by verbs in the infinitive, and mieux valoir que(only with the personal pronoun “il”) followed by the present subjunctive.

For example:

Tu aurais pu nous prévenir à l’avance.
You could have warned us.

Nous aurions pu les sauver mais nous avions peur de mourir.
We could have saved them, but we were afraid to die.

Ils auraient dû l’emmener à l’hôpital au lieu de le soigner à la maison.
They should have taken him to the hospital instead of treating him at home.

Zut alors! J’aurais dû lui donner mon numéro de téléphone.
Shoot! I should have given him my phone number.

Il aurait mieux valu acheter les billets avant le spectacle.
It would have been better to buy the tickets before the show.

Il aurait mieux valu qu’on achète les billets avant le spectacle.
It would have been better to buy the tickets before the show.