Future with 'Going to'
Anything after now is the future, and in English, we have many ways and tenses to talk about the future. Some are more basic and some are more advanced.
What Is 'Future with Going to'?
A common way to talk about the future in English is by using 'be going to'. Some argue that 'going to' is not tense. It is just a phrase, an expression, that we use to talk about plans and predictions in the future.
Future with 'going to': Structure
To construct the future tense with 'going to' use 'be' + 'going to' + the base form of the verb. Let us take a look at examples:
She
Remember, 'visit' is the base form (infinitive without 'to').
I
Future with 'going to': Negation
To make a negative sentence use the 'subject pronoun + the verb 'be' + 'not going to' + the base form of the verb.
Here are the examples:
It
They
Future with 'going to': Questions
To make yes/no questions, you need to put the verb 'to be' at the beginning, followed by the subject, 'going to' and the rest of the sentence. Take a look at this example:
He
To make wh- questions, you need wh- question words at the beginning of the question, right before the verb "to be," the subject, "going to," and the rest of the sentence. Take a look at the following example:
He's going to eat dinner
Using Future with 'Going to' to Talk about Plans
Future with 'going to': Uses
'Be going to' is commonly used in informal situations to talk about plans. It has different uses:
- Plans and Arrangements
- Predictions
Plans and Arrangements
If we know that we are going to do something tomorrow, this weekend, next month, next year, etc. in advance, we use 'be going to'.
We use 'be going to' to talk about our future plans. Often, we have already made up our minds about those plans and we are quite certain that they will happen.
Here are the examples:
I
Here, you are quite certain that you will find a job next month.
We need potatoes to make dinner. I
Here you have already made up your mind to buy potatoes.
Sometimes the decision is not made by you, yourself. Sometimes by using be going to we refer to other's intentions. For example, those that are in charge, or an authority's intention. Check out the examples for more clarification:
The government
Our boss
Predictions
'Be going to' is commonly used to predict something in the future that we know will happen for sure. In these examples, the structure is clearly used to make future predictions:
The sky is getting darker. It
Here the speaker is predicting that it will snow based on the observation that the sky is getting darker.
It's 3-0. They
It is obvious that they will lose the game based on the current score of 3-0.
We can also use the expression 'be going to' to talk about events that are about to happen in the near future or have just started happening. For example:
Look at the papers, she
The sky is getting dark. We
Tip!
In some informal situations, we can use 'be going to' to give instructions or emphasize that something needs to be done. Check out this example:
You
here in this example the person is instructing or emphasizing to someone that they should do their homework immediately.
Past with 'Be Going to'
We can use 'be going to' to talk about past plans, for example:
I
He
Informal Form of Going to: Gonna
In spoken English and in informal situations, native speakers use 'gonna' instead of going to. Remember that it is not correct to use it in written form and in formal situations. Here is an example:
This is
Remember 'gonna' is the contracted form of 'going to,' so you must use 'infinitive without to' after that.
Review
Besides using the auxiliary 'will' you can use 'to be going to' to talk about future plans and predictions. Whenever we use 'to be going to' for plans they are fixed and we are sure that they are going to happen.
Structure, Contraction, Affirmative, Negative, informal, and Question Forms
| Structure | subject + am/is/are + going to + base form of verb |
|---|---|
| affirmative |
He |
| negative |
He |
| contraction |
He |
| informal |
He |
| yes/no question |
|
| -wh question |
|
When to Use 'to Be Going to'?
- To talk about planned situations
- To talk about predicting the future
- To give orders
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