To say "after eating," English uses an -ing form: after eating, after having eaten. French has its own dedicated construction — après avoir mangé — which uses the past infinitive (infinitif passé) of the verb. The structure is fixed: the preposition après, the auxiliary (avoir or être) in its bare infinitive form, and then the past participle of the main verb. This is one of the cleanest pieces of French syntax: once you understand the auxiliary system from the passé composé, the après avoir construction is essentially that same system stripped of person and tense, ready to attach as a temporal adverbial. The only catches are the auxiliary choice, the participle agreement (which still applies), and the rule that the implied subject of the après-clause must equal the subject of the main clause.
The construction in a single shape
The formula is rigid:
Après + infinitive of avoir/être + past participle of main verb
The implied subject of the past infinitive is the subject of the main clause that follows. The construction names a completed action prior to the main-clause action.
Après avoir mangé, je suis sorti.
After eating, I went out.
Après avoir lu le livre, elle l'a prêté à sa sœur.
After reading the book, she lent it to her sister.
Après être arrivés à Paris, nous avons cherché un hôtel.
After arriving in Paris, we looked for a hotel.
Après s'être lavé, il s'est couché.
After washing up, he went to bed.
The construction is high-frequency in both written and spoken French — far more frequent than the alternative après que + indicative — and it is the natural way to chain two completed actions in sequence.
Auxiliary choice: identical to compound tenses
The auxiliary in après avoir / après être follows the same rule as in the passé composé. Most verbs take avoir. A closed list of motion and change-of-state verbs takes être, and all pronominal (reflexive) verbs take être.
Avoir-verbs — the default, used for nearly all transitive and many intransitive verbs.
Après avoir parlé au directeur, elle a quitté le bureau.
After speaking to the director, she left the office.
Après avoir bu son café, il est parti travailler.
After drinking his coffee, he left for work.
Après avoir fini mes devoirs, j'ai regardé un film.
After finishing my homework, I watched a film.
Être-verbs — the ~17 verbs of motion and change of state, plus their compounds.
Après être venu nous voir, il est reparti immédiatement.
After coming to see us, he left again immediately.
Après être sortie, Marie a réalisé qu'elle avait oublié son téléphone.
After going out, Marie realized she had forgotten her phone.
Après être tombé dans l'escalier, mon grand-père a passé une semaine à l'hôpital.
After falling down the stairs, my grandfather spent a week in the hospital.
Pronominal verbs — always être, with the reflexive pronoun preceding the auxiliary infinitive.
Après s'être réveillée, elle a pris une douche.
After waking up, she took a shower.
Après nous être rencontrés à Paris, nous sommes devenus amis.
After meeting in Paris, we became friends.
The reflexive pronoun in this construction agrees with the implied subject — me, te, se, nous, vous, se — even though the auxiliary itself is in the unconjugated infinitive form. The pronoun comes before the auxiliary: s'être levé, nous être rencontrés, vous être habillés.
Past participle agreement
The participle in après avoir / après être still agrees just as it does in compound tenses.
With être, the participle agrees with the implied subject in gender and number.
Après être partie, Marie a compris son erreur.
After leaving, Marie understood her mistake. — partie agrees with Marie (f.sg.).
Après être arrivés, les enfants ont couru au jardin.
After arriving, the children ran to the garden. — arrivés agrees with les enfants (m.pl.).
Après être nées, les jumelles ont été placées dans une couveuse.
After being born, the twins were placed in an incubator. — nées agrees with les jumelles (f.pl.).
With pronominal verbs, agreement follows the standard reflexive rule: the participle agrees with the reflexive pronoun if that pronoun is a direct object, but not if it is an indirect object. (See the dedicated page on reflexive participle agreement for the full rule.)
Après s'être lavée, elle est sortie.
After washing herself, she went out. — lavée agrees with se (DO).
Après s'être lavé les mains, elle est passée à table.
After washing her hands, she sat down to eat. — lavé invariable: se is IO here, les mains is the DO.
With avoir, the participle is invariable in this construction unless a preceding direct object happens to appear inside the après-clause itself — a rare configuration, since the construction usually takes a direct object after the participle.
Après avoir lu ces livres, j'ai compris l'histoire.
After reading these books, I understood the story. — lu invariable; ces livres follows.
Les livres que j'ai lus, après les avoir terminés, m'ont marqué.
The books I read, after having finished them, left a strong impression on me. — terminés agrees with les (DO preceding).
The second example shows the pattern: when a clitic direct object precedes the avoir + participe sequence inside the après-clause, agreement applies normally.
Negation inside après avoir
To negate the action of the après-clause — to say "after not doing X" — both negation particles cluster before the infinitive of the auxiliary. This pre-positional negation is the same as in any infinitive clause: ne pas avoir, ne pas être.
Après ne pas avoir dormi de la nuit, elle était épuisée.
After not sleeping all night, she was exhausted.
Après ne pas être venu hier, il s'est excusé aujourd'hui.
After not coming yesterday, he apologized today.
This is the only negation pattern; you cannot split ne ... pas around avoir in this construction.
The same-subject rule
The après avoir construction has a strict subject requirement: the implied subject of the past infinitive must be the same as the subject of the main clause. Because the construction has no overt subject, the reader is forced to interpret it as referring to the main-clause subject. This means a sentence like "après avoir fini, le téléphone a sonné" implies that the phone finished something — which is unintended and confusing.
Après avoir fini, je suis sorti.
After finishing, I went out. — same subject (je) throughout.
Après être rentrée, Marie a préparé le dîner.
After getting home, Marie made dinner. — same subject (Marie).
When the subject of the prior action differs from the main-clause subject, you cannot use après avoir. You must use the alternative après que + indicative.
The alternative: après que + indicatif
For different-subject configurations, French uses après que followed by a finite verb in the indicative. (Note: prescriptive grammar requires the indicative here, but a robust minority of speakers and writers — even careful ones — use the subjunctive after après que by analogy with avant que + subjonctif. The Académie française considers this an error; in formal contexts, stick with the indicative.)
Après que tu es parti, j'ai trouvé tes clés sur la table.
After you left, I found your keys on the table. — different subjects, indicative.
Après que les invités ont quitté la maison, nous avons commencé à ranger.
After the guests left, we started cleaning up.
Après que le film a commencé, les retardataires sont entrés discrètement.
After the film started, the latecomers came in quietly.
In modern speech, après que sounds heavy and is often avoided. Speakers prefer to rephrase: quand tu es parti, j'ai trouvé... or après ton départ, j'ai trouvé.... The same-subject après avoir construction, by contrast, is everywhere — natural, idiomatic, and stylistically light.
Stylistic notes
Position. The après avoir clause typically opens the sentence, with the main clause following after a comma. It can also follow the main clause, especially when balancing rhythm.
J'ai téléphoné à mes parents après avoir lu la lettre.
I called my parents after reading the letter.
Stacking with other temporal adverbials. The construction stacks easily with puis, ensuite, and enfin in narrative writing — useful for chaining a sequence of completed actions in a single subject's experience.
Après avoir terminé mes études, j'ai voyagé un an, puis j'ai trouvé un emploi à Lyon.
After finishing my studies, I traveled for a year, then I found a job in Lyon.
Register. The construction is register-neutral — equally at home in conversation, journalism, and literary prose. Unlike some compound forms (passé simple, subjunctive imperfect), après avoir is universal.
Common Mistakes
❌ Après manger, je suis sorti.
Incorrect — après cannot take a bare infinitive in standard French; you must use the past infinitive.
✅ Après avoir mangé, je suis sorti.
After eating, I went out.
❌ Après avoir parti, il a oublié son sac.
Incorrect — partir takes être, not avoir.
✅ Après être parti, il a oublié son sac.
After leaving, he forgot his bag.
❌ Après avoir fini, le téléphone a sonné.
Incorrect — implies the phone finished; the construction requires same-subject and the main subject here is le téléphone, not the implied speaker.
✅ Après que j'ai eu fini, le téléphone a sonné.
After I had finished, the phone rang. — different subjects, indicative.
❌ Après être venu, Marie a préparé le dîner.
Incorrect — Marie is feminine, the participle must agree.
✅ Après être venue, Marie a préparé le dîner.
After coming, Marie made dinner.
❌ Après s'être lavé, ils sont sortis.
Incorrect when 'they' is plural masculine — the participle must agree with the reflexive pronoun.
✅ Après s'être lavés, ils sont sortis.
After washing up, they went out.
❌ Après ne avoir pas mangé, j'ai eu faim toute la journée.
Incorrect — both negation particles must precede the infinitive of avoir.
✅ Après ne pas avoir mangé, j'ai eu faim toute la journée.
After not eating, I was hungry all day.
The construction rewards careful attention to a small set of moving parts — auxiliary choice, participle agreement, same-subject identification — but once those parts are second nature, après avoir becomes one of the most useful tools in your French syntactic toolbox: a clean, register-neutral way to connect two actions in time without resorting to the heavier après que + indicatif.
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