Past tense of lie
irregular verb
The past tense of lie is lay. The past participle is lain.
Forms of lie
| Base form (V1) | lie /laɪ̯/ |
|---|---|
| Past tense (V2) | lay /leɪ/ |
| Past participle (V3) | lain /leɪn/ |
| Present participle | lying /ˈlaɪ.ɪŋ/ |
| Third person singular | lies /laɪz/ |
Less standard forms: laid (colloquial).
Past tense of lie by meaning
- to rest in a horizontal position on a surface.: lay
- to give false information intentionally with intent to deceive.: lied
Lay and lain in a sentence
- It is not clear, however, in what this 'contradiction' lay.1978 [1976], Leszek Kołakowski, translated by P[aul] S[teven] Falla, Main Currents of Marxism, volume III: The Breakdown, Oxford: Clarendon...
- Most websites contain metadata to tell the computer how to lay out the content on the screen.From the entry metadata
- As I lay on my back, a pain shot down from my neck to my waist.From the entry down
- While the Pequod lay at Nantucket, Peleg put Ishmael down for the three hundredth lay.From the entry lay
- Worm and parcel with the lay; turn and serve the other way.From the entry lay
Meaning of lie
- verb To rest in a horizontal position on a surface.
- verb To be placed or situated.
- verb To abide; to remain for a longer or shorter time; to be in a certain state or condition.
Questions about the past tense of lie
- What is the past tense of lie?
- The past tense of lie is lay.
- What is the past participle of lie?
- The past participle of lie is lain.
- Is lie a regular or irregular verb?
- Lie is an irregular verb: its past tense is not formed with -ed.
- Is laid correct?
- laid is marked colloquial in Wiktionary. The usual past tense of lie is lay.
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: lie (page history and authors) and the entries of its forms. Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws left out forms marked obsolete, archaic, rare or dialectal and added the examples. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
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Cite this page: “Past tense of lie.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/past-tense/lie. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.