Persian can produce رفته خواهد بود by putting a past participle before the future of بودن: literally “will be gone,” and in a suitable context “will have gone.” The form places a completed event or its result before a future reference point. It occurs in formal predictions, technical projections, and translation-influenced prose.
It is not a high-frequency tense on a par with رفته است or رفته بود. Many grammars do not list a separate future perfect because modern Iranian Persian normally expresses the same timeline with a simple future, a futurate present or present perfect, and a deadline phrase such as تا فردا “by tomorrow.” A good learner must therefore recognize رفته خواهد بود without overusing it.
Formation: participle plus future بودن
Build the lexical past participle, then add the future of بودن:
past participle + خواهـ with person ending + بود
| Person | رفتن | Structure |
|---|---|---|
| I | رفته خواهم بود | رفته + خواهم + بود |
| you (singular) | رفته خواهی بود | رفته + خواهی + بود |
| he/she/it | رفته خواهد بود | رفته + خواهد + بود |
| we | رفته خواهیم بود | رفته + خواهیم + بود |
| you (plural/polite) | رفته خواهید بود | رفته + خواهید + بود |
| they | رفته خواهند بود | رفته + خواهند + بود |
تا زمان رسیدن ما، آخرین قطار رفته خواهد بود.
tâ zamân-e residan-e mâ, âkharin qatâr rafte khâhad bud.
By the time we arrive, the last train will have left. (formal, marked future perfect)
تا پایان هفته همهی نمونهها بررسی شده خواهند بود.
tâ pâyân-e hafte hame-ye nemune-hâ barrasi shode khâhand bud.
By the end of the week, all the samples will have been examined. (formal scientific projection; passive)
The participle stays invariant. Person and number appear on خواهـ; final بود is the bare past stem required by the Persian future construction. Review that auxiliary structure on Future with خواستن.
An event completed before a future point
The construction needs a future reference point, usually expressed by تا “by/until,” پیش از “before,” or a future time clause. Without that anchor, رفته خواهد بود can sound like an overelaborate prediction about a result state.
پیش از آغاز مرحلهی دوم، گروه نخست آزمایش را تمام کرده خواهد بود.
pish az âghâz-e marhale-ye dovvom, goruh-e nokhost âzmâyesh râ tamâm karde khâhad bud.
Before the second phase begins, the first group will have finished the experiment. (formal technical planning)
وقتی حکم نهایی صادر شود، متهم بیش از یک سال در بازداشت مانده خواهد بود.
vaqti hokm-e nahâyi sâder shavad, mottaham bishtar az yek sâl dar bâzdâsht mânde khâhad bud.
When the final judgment is issued, the defendant will have remained in detention for more than a year. (formal legal projection)
The وقتی clause uses present subjunctive صادر شود because it names a future boundary. The future-perfect predicate evaluates the accumulated result at that boundary.
With telic events such as finishing or leaving, English perfect translation is straightforward. With states and posture verbs, the same form can mean “will be in the resulting state” rather than a sharply bounded completed event.
تا آن ساعت مسافران چند ساعت در سالن منتظر مانده خواهند بود.
tâ ân sâ'at mosâferân chand sâ'at dar sâlon montazer mânde khâhand bud.
By that time, the passengers will have been waiting in the hall for several hours. (formal projection; accumulated state)
Compound predicates and passives
For a compound verb, form the participle of its light verb first: بررسی کردن → بررسی کرده, تصمیم گرفتن → تصمیم گرفته. The future of بودن follows the entire participial predicate.
تا شروع نشست، دبیرخانه همهی پیشنهادها را دستهبندی کرده خواهد بود.
tâ shoru'-e neshast, dabirkhâne hame-ye pishnehâd-hâ râ daste-bandi karde khâhad bud.
By the start of the meeting, the secretariat will have categorized all the proposals. (formal administrative projection)
A passive already contains participial شده: تکمیل شده خواهد بود “will have been completed.” Such stacks are grammatical but dense. An active clause or a simple future passive is often easier to process.
در زمان بهرهبرداری، مسیر اضطراری تکمیل شده خواهد بود.
dar zamân-e bahre-bardâri, masir-e ezterâri takmil shode khâhad bud.
By the time operations begin, the emergency route will have been completed. (formal engineering report)
The lighter مسیر اضطراری تا آن زمان تکمیل خواهد شد usually communicates the planning outcome just as well.
Negation and two possible scopes
Negation can belong inside the participle or to future بودن, with a potential difference in focus:
- تکمیل نشده خواهد بود: predicts the result “not completed” at the future point;
- تکمیل شده نخواهد بود: denies that the completed state will hold.
Both are heavy. Modern prose normally rewrites them as تا آن زمان تکمیل نمیشود “it will not be completed by then” or تا آن زمان هنوز تکمیل نشده است “by then it still will not be complete,” depending on viewpoint.
با برنامهی فعلی، بخش دوم تا پایان ماه تکمیل نشده خواهد بود.
bâ barnâme-ye fe'li, bakhsh-e dovvom tâ pâyân-e mâh takmil na-shode khâhad bud.
Under the current plan, the second section will not have been completed by the end of the month. (formal, marked negative)
Writers should prefer that form only when the predicted future state itself is under analysis. Otherwise the simple future gives a cleaner sentence.
What Persian normally says instead
The most important B2 skill is choosing a natural equivalent rather than reproducing every English auxiliary. Three alternatives dominate:
Simple future plus a completion deadline
همهی مدارک تا فردا بررسی خواهند شد.
hame-ye madârek tâ fardâ barrasi khâhand shod.
All the documents will have been reviewed by tomorrow. (formal natural alternative; literally, will be reviewed by tomorrow)
Futurate present or present perfect
تا برگردی، شام را آماده کردهام.
tâ bar-gardi, shâm râ âmâde karde-am.
By the time you come back, I'll have dinner ready. (neutral conversation; present perfect with future deadline)
تا ساعت پنج کار تمام میشود.
tâ sâ'at-e panj kâr tamâm mi-shavad.
The work will be finished by five. (neutral; futurate present)
Simple future active
تا جمعه نسخهی نهایی را تحویل خواهم داد.
tâ jom'e noskhe-ye nahâyi râ tahvil khâham dâd.
I will have submitted the final version by Friday. (formal; Persian simple future plus deadline)
The deadline supplies completion-before-future semantics, so Persian does not need a morphologically separate everyday future perfect.
Register
رفته خواهد بود is comprehensible and structurally regular, but it is markedly formal, bookish, or translation-shaped. It is most defensible in projections that evaluate a result state at a future stage. Everyday Tehran conversation almost always uses present, present perfect, or a deadline plus a simpler verb.
تا ما برسیم، فیلم تموم شده.
tâ mâ be-resim, film tamum shode.
By the time we get there, the movie will be over. (informal, regional: Tehran; natural alternative)
Do not “correct” that colloquial sentence to فیلم تمام شده خواهد بود unless the speaker deliberately adopts an unusually formal style.
Common Mistakes
1. Copying English auxiliary-first order
❌ قطار خواهد رفته بود.
Incorrect — the Persian participle precedes the future of بودن.
✅ تا آن ساعت قطار رفته خواهد بود.
tâ ân sâ'at qatâr rafte khâhad bud.
By that time, the train will have left. (formal, marked)
2. Using the infinitive بودن after خواهـ
❌ تا فردا گزارش آماده شده خواهد بودن.
Incorrect — Persian future takes bare past stem بود, not full infinitive بودن.
✅ تا فردا گزارش آماده شده خواهد بود.
tâ fardâ gozâresh âmâde shode khâhad bud.
By tomorrow, the report will have been prepared. (formal, marked)
3. Marking person on both the participle and خواهـ
❌ آنها تا ظهر رفتهاند خواهند بود.
Incorrect — رفته is invariant; plural agreement belongs only on خواهند.
✅ آنها تا ظهر از هتل رفته خواهند بود.
ân-hâ tâ zohr az hotel rafte khâhand bud.
They will have left the hotel by noon. (formal, marked)
4. Inserting the future auxiliary before a compound participle
❌ گروه تا فردا دادهها را بررسی خواهد کرده بود.
Incorrect — first build بررسی کرده, then add خواهد بود.
✅ گروه تا فردا دادهها را بررسی کرده خواهد بود.
goruh tâ fardâ dâde-hâ râ barrasi karde khâhad bud.
The group will have examined the data by tomorrow. (formal, highly marked)
Key Takeaways
- رفته خواهد بود is past participle + future خواهـ
- bare بود.
- It locates a completed event or result before a future reference point.
- The form is grammatical but marked; it is not the normal conversational equivalent of every English future perfect.
- Deadline phrases let simple future, present, or present perfect express the same timeline more naturally.
- In compounds and passives, build the entire participial predicate before adding خواهد بود.
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