This is the single biggest tense-mismatch error anglophones make in French. English speakers learning French look at the sentence I have been waiting for an hour and translate it to j'ai attendu depuis une heure. The result is a sentence that sounds odd and means something different from what they intended. The correct French is j'attends depuis une heure — present tense. The reason is not arbitrary, and once you see the underlying logic you stop making the mistake.
The core principle: present tense for ongoing situations
French and English carve up the time line differently. English uses the present perfect (have lived, have waited, have known) for situations that started in the past and are still going on. French uses the simple present (j'habite, j'attends, je connais) for those same situations. The present tense in French covers a wider span than in English: it covers what is happening now AND what has been happening up to now.
The marker that triggers this present tense in French is depuis. Whenever depuis introduces a duration or a starting point and the action is still ongoing, French stays in the present.
J'habite à Lyon depuis cinq ans.
I have been living in Lyon for five years.
On attend depuis vingt minutes, ils arrivent quand ?
We have been waiting for twenty minutes — when are they coming?
Elle apprend le français depuis trois mois.
She has been learning French for three months.
Je travaille ici depuis 2018.
I have been working here since 2018.
Notice how all four English sentences use have been + -ing (or have + past participle), while French uses the simple present. This is not about the action being completed or not — it is about French using the present to describe situations that started in the past and are still going on.
Why French does it this way
Think of depuis as marking a duration or a starting point that flows up to the present moment. The action is still happening — it has not ended. French treats this as fundamentally a present-tense situation: what I am doing now, and have been doing. The duration adds context, but the action is still in progress.
English, by contrast, marks the having been doing part with the perfect, then adds for / since to specify how long. The two languages encode the same reality differently: French foregrounds the ongoing action (present), English foregrounds the cumulative span (perfect).
If you say j'ai habité à Lyon depuis cinq ans, a French ear hears: I lived in Lyon five years ago and stopped, which is a different statement entirely. The passé composé closes the action; the present keeps it open.
depuis vs il y a — open vs closed
The pair depuis and il y a is a frequent source of confusion because both express a relationship to past time. They are not interchangeable.
- Depuis
- duration = for X amount of time (ongoing, situation still true) → present tense
- Il y a
- duration = X amount of time ago (closed, completed event) → passé composé
J'habite à Paris depuis cinq ans.
I have been living in Paris for five years (still living there).
Je suis arrivé à Paris il y a cinq ans.
I arrived in Paris five years ago (a single past event).
Je le connais depuis l'université.
I have known him since university (still know him).
J'ai rencontré Sophie il y a deux mois.
I met Sophie two months ago (single event in the past).
A useful test: ask whether the action is still happening now. If yes → depuis + present. If no → il y a + passé composé.
depuis vs pendant — ongoing vs completed duration
Another pair that confuses anglophones because both can translate to English for.
- Depuis
- duration = for X amount of time (ongoing) → present tense
- Pendant
- duration = for X amount of time (completed, closed) → passé composé
Il habite à Berlin depuis dix ans.
He has been living in Berlin for ten years (still there).
Il a habité à Berlin pendant dix ans.
He lived in Berlin for ten years (no longer there).
The choice between depuis and pendant tells your listener whether the situation is still true. Depuis says yes; pendant says no.
J'apprends le piano depuis quinze ans.
I have been playing piano for fifteen years (still play).
J'ai appris le piano pendant quinze ans.
I played piano for fifteen years (stopped now).
depuis with imperfect — past situations still ongoing at a past moment
The same logic that pairs depuis with present tense in now contexts pairs depuis with the imperfect in then contexts. When you talk about a past moment and want to say a situation had been going on up to that moment, you use the imperfect with depuis.
Il habitait à Paris depuis dix ans quand il a rencontré Sophie.
He had been living in Paris for ten years when he met Sophie.
Elle apprenait le français depuis six mois quand elle est partie en France.
She had been learning French for six months when she left for France.
On t'attendait depuis une heure quand tu es enfin arrivé.
We had been waiting for an hour when you finally arrived.
The English equivalent is the past perfect progressive (had been living). The French is the imperfect, never the pluperfect. Anglophones often want to use avait habité depuis dix ans, transferring the past perfect, but French treats this exactly like the present-tense case — the imperfect is the past version of the present, and depuis keeps demanding ongoing tense.
The negative exception: depuis with passé composé
There is one situation where depuis DOES work with the passé composé: when the verb is negated. The reason is that an absence is itself a kind of ongoing state — I have not seen Paul describes an ongoing condition (the not-seeing), and French allows the passé composé in that case.
Je n'ai pas vu Paul depuis dix ans.
I haven't seen Paul in ten years.
On n'a pas mangé depuis ce matin.
We haven't eaten since this morning.
Elle n'a pas pris de vacances depuis trois ans.
She hasn't taken a holiday in three years.
The logic: a negative passé composé describes the persistence of a non-event. The non-seeing of Paul started ten years ago and continues. Depuis fits because the situation (the not-seeing) is still ongoing.
This is one of those points where French gives you a clean, almost mathematical pattern: positive ongoing situation → present + depuis; negative ongoing situation → passé composé + depuis.
Asking about duration: depuis combien de temps and depuis quand
Two question forms accompany depuis. They are not synonyms — one asks for a duration, the other for a starting point.
- Depuis combien de temps? → for how long? (expects a duration in answer)
- Depuis quand? → since when? (expects a starting point in answer)
Depuis combien de temps tu apprends le français ?
How long have you been learning French?
Depuis quand tu apprends le français ?
Since when have you been learning French?
J'apprends le français depuis trois ans. (depuis combien de temps)
I have been learning French for three years.
J'apprends le français depuis 2023. (depuis quand)
I have been learning French since 2023.
The two are interchangeable in casual speech, but careful speakers respect the distinction. Depuis quand invites a date or a clear starting point; depuis combien de temps invites a measurable span.
Cela fait / ça fait — the alternative pattern
French has a second way to say for X amount of time, and it is just as common as depuis: cela fait (formal) or ça fait (informal) + duration + que + clause. The verb in the que-clause stays in the present (or imperfect), exactly as with depuis.
Ça fait dix ans que je suis ici.
I have been here for ten years.
Ça fait combien de temps que tu attends ?
How long have you been waiting?
Cela fait deux mois que nous n'avons pas eu de ses nouvelles.
We haven't heard from him in two months.
Ça faisait des heures qu'on parlait quand on a remarqué qu'il était minuit.
We had been talking for hours when we noticed it was midnight.
The construction is fully equivalent to depuis — the same tense logic applies. Ça fait dix ans que je suis ici and je suis ici depuis dix ans mean the same thing. Native speakers alternate between them for rhythm and emphasis. Note that ça fait puts the duration first, which can feel more emphatic in casual speech: ça fait des années que je te le dis ! (I've been telling you for years!).
There is also il y a... que with similar function but more formal: il y a dix ans que j'habite ici (I have been living here for ten years). This is grammatical but less common in everyday speech.
A side comparison
To pin down the difference between the four patterns, here is the same situation expressed four ways.
J'habite à Paris depuis dix ans.
I have been living in Paris for ten years.
Ça fait dix ans que j'habite à Paris.
I have been living in Paris for ten years.
J'ai habité à Paris pendant dix ans.
I lived in Paris for ten years (no longer).
Je suis arrivé à Paris il y a dix ans.
I arrived in Paris ten years ago (a one-time event).
The first two say the same thing (still in Paris). The third says it ended. The fourth marks the moment of arrival, not the duration of staying.
Common Mistakes
These are the highest-frequency anglophone errors with depuis. The transfer pattern in each case is from English present perfect to French passé composé — and that is exactly the wrong move.
❌ J'ai habité ici depuis cinq ans.
Incorrect — passé composé closes the action. Means 'I lived here five years ago and stopped'.
✅ J'habite ici depuis cinq ans.
I have been living here for five years (still here).
❌ J'ai attendu depuis une heure.
Incorrect — present tense for ongoing actions.
✅ J'attends depuis une heure.
I have been waiting for an hour.
❌ Elle a appris le piano depuis dix ans (et joue toujours).
Incorrect if she still plays — use the present.
✅ Elle apprend le piano depuis dix ans.
She has been learning piano for ten years (still does).
❌ Il avait habité à Paris depuis dix ans quand...
Incorrect — French uses imperfect with depuis in past contexts, not pluperfect.
✅ Il habitait à Paris depuis dix ans quand il a rencontré Sophie.
He had been living in Paris for ten years when he met Sophie.
❌ Je connais Marie pendant dix ans.
Incorrect — pendant is for completed durations.
✅ Je connais Marie depuis dix ans.
I have known Marie for ten years.
Key takeaways
The English present perfect (have lived, have waited, have known) is a trap when you translate to French. Whenever the action is still going on, drop the have part and use simple French present + depuis. The same logic applies in past contexts: drop the had of past perfect and use the imperfect.
The exception worth memorizing: with negation, depuis does take the passé composé. Je n'ai pas vu Paul depuis des années is correct because the non-seeing is itself the ongoing state.
Once you have absorbed the principle, depuis becomes one of the most useful French time expressions you can master. It is everywhere in conversation — depuis quand tu es là ?, depuis quand tu fais ça ?, depuis combien de temps ça dure ? — and getting the tense right immediately marks you as someone who has internalized French rather than translating from English.
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