Past tense of tell
irregular verb
The past tense of tell is told. The past participle is also told.
Forms of tell
| Base form (V1) | tell /tɛl/ |
|---|---|
| Past tense (V2) | told /təʊld/ |
| Past participle (V3) | told /təʊld/ |
| Present participle | telling /ˈtɛlɪŋ/ |
| Third person singular | tells /tɛlz/ |
Less standard forms: telled (dialectal).
Told in a sentence
- All told, there were over a dozen. Can you tell time on a clock? He had untold wealth.
- Finally, someone told him the truth. He seems to like to tell lies.
- Nobody told me to do it. I did it of my own accord.From the entry accord
- You told me I could do that, but she said that I could not.From the entry but
- His rage only increased when I told him of the lost money.From the entry increase
Meaning of tell
- verb To determine the number, amount, or value of [something].
- verb To notice, discern. (Roughly, "can tell" means "know" but with a sense of direct perception.).
- verb To pick up on a difference. (See tell apart for more.).
Verbs like tell
Questions about the past tense of tell
- What is the past tense of tell?
- The past tense of tell is told.
- What is the past participle of tell?
- The past participle of tell is told.
- Is tell a regular or irregular verb?
- Tell is an irregular verb: its past tense is not formed with -ed.
- Is telled correct?
- telled is marked dialectal in Wiktionary. The usual past tense of tell is told.
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: tell (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.
Last updated:
Cite this page: “Past tense of tell.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/past-tense/tell. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.