The futuro anteriore is Italian's compound future — the form you use to say "I will have eaten," "they will have arrived," "by then we will have finished." Structurally it is the futuro semplice of avere or essere plus the past participle, and that is the entire mechanic. If you already know the passato prossimo, you know 90% of what is on this page: every rule about auxiliary choice and participle agreement carries over with no modification — only the tense of the auxiliary changes.
The good news is that avere and essere are both perfectly regular in the futuro semplice (avrò, sarò) — there are no exotic forms to learn. The work of this page is in stitching the auxiliary together with the participle and remembering to apply the same auxiliary-selection rule you use in the passato prossimo.
The basic formula
Futuro anteriore = futuro semplice of avere/essere + past participle
| Person | avere (futuro) | essere (futuro) |
|---|---|---|
| io | avrò | sarò |
| tu | avrai | sarai |
| lui / lei | avrà | sarà |
| noi | avremo | saremo |
| voi | avrete | sarete |
| loro | avranno | saranno |
Note the grave accents on the io and lui forms (avrò, avrà, sarò, sarà) — these are obligatory. Writing avro or sara is a spelling error, not a stylistic choice.
Conjugation with avere
Verbs that take avere in the passato prossimo also take avere in the futuro anteriore. This is the majority of Italian verbs — virtually all transitives, plus a large group of intransitives. The participle does not change for the subject.
| Person | avere |
|
|---|---|---|
| io | avrò | mangiato |
| tu | avrai | mangiato |
| lui / lei | avrà | mangiato |
| noi | avremo | mangiato |
| voi | avrete | mangiato |
| loro | avranno | mangiato |
Quando arriverete, avremo già mangiato.
By the time you arrive, we'll have already eaten.
Tra un'ora avrò finito di studiare e potrò uscire.
In an hour I'll have finished studying and I'll be able to go out.
Se non ti chiama entro stasera, vorrà dire che avrà perso il numero.
If he doesn't call you by tonight, it'll mean he must have lost the number.
Avranno già letto il messaggio, ma non hanno ancora risposto.
They must have already read the message, but they haven't replied yet.
Conjugation with essere
Verbs that take essere in the passato prossimo — motion verbs (andare, venire, partire, arrivare, tornare), change-of-state verbs (nascere, morire, diventare, cambiare), reflexives, and a small set of others — take essere here too. The participle agrees in gender and number with the subject, exactly as in the passato prossimo.
| Person | essere |
|
|---|---|---|
| io | sarò | partito / partita |
| tu | sarai | partito / partita |
| lui / lei | sarà | partito / partita |
| noi | saremo | partiti / partite |
| voi | sarete | partiti / partite |
| loro | saranno | partiti / partite |
Sarò partito prima delle nove, quindi non chiamarmi dopo.
I'll have left before nine, so don't call me after that.
Quando ci vedremo a Natale, Anna sarà già tornata dal Giappone.
When we meet at Christmas, Anna will have already come back from Japan.
Saranno arrivati ormai, il treno era in orario.
They must have arrived by now, the train was on time.
Mi sarò sbagliata io, scusami.
I must have been the one who got it wrong, sorry. (female speaker)
Participle agreement: the same two rules
The two agreement rules from the passato prossimo carry over verbatim:
Rule 1 — with essere, agree with the subject. The participle takes -o / -a / -i / -e to match the gender and number of the subject. Maria sarà partita (feminine singular). I ragazzi saranno partiti (masculine plural). Le ragazze saranno partite (feminine plural).
Le mie sorelle saranno già uscite per andare a cena.
My sisters will have already gone out for dinner.
Carlo sarà arrivato in ufficio prima di me.
Carlo will have arrived at the office before me.
Rule 2 — with avere, the participle is invariable, except when a direct-object pronoun precedes the verb. By default the participle stays in its dictionary form (-ato / -uto / -ito or the irregular shape). But if a clitic pronoun like lo, la, li, le, ne comes before the auxiliary, the participle agrees with that pronoun.
Avrò letto venti pagine prima di addormentarmi.
I'll have read twenty pages before falling asleep. (no clitic — invariable)
Le pagine? Le avrò lette tutte entro domani.
The pages? I'll have read them all by tomorrow. (clitic 'le' triggers agreement → lette)
La macchina? L'avrai già lavata, immagino.
The car? You'll have already washed it, I imagine. (clitic 'la' → lavata)
The agreement is obligatory with lo, la, li, le, ne preceding the verb. With other clitics (mi, ti, ci, vi) used as direct objects, agreement is optional — traditional grammar prescribes it (Maria ci ha visti / viste), but modern colloquial Italian frequently leaves the participle invariable (Maria ci ha visto). Both are accepted today.
Putting it all together: a worked paradigm
Here is finire (avere) and andare (essere) side by side in the futuro anteriore. Notice how the auxiliary changes person while the participle stays put — except for essere, where the participle ending tracks the subject.
| Person | finire (avrò + finito) | andare (sarò + andato/-a) |
|---|---|---|
| io | avrò finito | sarò andato / sarò andata |
| tu | avrai finito | sarai andato / sarai andata |
| lui / lei | avrà finito | sarà andato / sarà andata |
| noi | avremo finito | saremo andati / saremo andate |
| voi | avrete finito | sarete andati / sarete andate |
| loro | avranno finito | saranno andati / saranno andate |
Reflexive verbs
Reflexive verbs always take essere, so the participle agrees with the subject — the same logic as the passato prossimo. The reflexive pronoun precedes the auxiliary.
| Person | svegliarsi (futuro anteriore) |
|---|---|
| io | mi sarò svegliato / svegliata |
| tu | ti sarai svegliato / svegliata |
| lui / lei | si sarà svegliato / svegliata |
| noi | ci saremo svegliati / svegliate |
| voi | vi sarete svegliati / svegliate |
| loro | si saranno svegliati / svegliate |
Quando arriverà l'idraulico, mi sarò già lavata e vestita.
By the time the plumber arrives, I'll have already washed and gotten dressed.
Comparison with English
The futuro anteriore maps cleanly onto the English future perfect: "will have + participle." This is one of the few cases where English and Italian line up almost exactly in form and function — much friendlier than, say, the imperfetto.
| Italian | English |
|---|---|
| avrò mangiato | I will have eaten |
| sarà partito | he will have left |
| avremo finito | we will have finished |
| saranno arrivati | they will have arrived |
The one place the structural symmetry breaks down is temporal subordinate clauses — when, as soon as, after — where Italian uses futuro anteriore but English defaults to the simple present perfect (when I have finished) or even simple past (when I finish). That divergence is covered in futuro in temporal clauses.
Common mistakes
❌ Quando saro arrivato, ti chiamo.
Incorrect — sarò requires a grave accent on the ò. Without it, the form is wrong.
✅ Quando sarò arrivato, ti chiamo.
Correct — the io and lui forms of essere/avere in the futuro always carry a grave accent.
❌ Maria sarà mangiato a casa.
Incorrect — mangiare takes avere, not essere.
✅ Maria avrà mangiato a casa.
Correct — auxiliary selection follows the same rule as the passato prossimo.
❌ Le ragazze saranno partito.
Incorrect — with essere, the participle must agree with the subject (feminine plural).
✅ Le ragazze saranno partite.
Correct — partite agrees with le ragazze.
❌ La torta? L'avrò mangiato tutta.
Incorrect — when 'la' precedes the verb, the participle must agree (feminine singular).
✅ La torta? L'avrò mangiata tutta.
Correct — preceding direct-object pronoun triggers participle agreement on avere.
❌ Avrò essere finito per le otto.
Incorrect — the futuro anteriore is built with the futuro of avere/essere, not with avere + the infinitive of essere.
✅ Avrò finito per le otto.
Correct — futuro of avere + participio passato.
Key takeaways
The futuro anteriore is a mechanical extension of the passato prossimo. Take the passato prossimo (ho mangiato, sono andato), swap the present-tense auxiliary for the futuro semplice (avrò, sarò), and you are done. Auxiliary choice, participle agreement, clitic placement — all identical.
Three points worth pinning down:
Auxiliary choice = passato prossimo rules. Avere with most verbs, essere with motion/change-of-state verbs and reflexives.
Participle agreement = passato prossimo rules. With essere, agrees with the subject. With avere, invariable except when lo / la / li / le / ne precedes.
Spelling: never forget the grave accent on avrò, avrà, sarò, sarà. Drop it and the form is wrong.
The interesting question — and the reason this tense matters — is when to use it. That is the subject of futuro anteriore: usage, which covers both the temporal "before another future event" use and the surprisingly common epistemic use ("must have ...") that lets you make educated guesses about past events.
Now practice Italian
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Open the Italian course →Related Topics
- Futuro Anteriore: UsageB1 — When Italians actually reach for the futuro anteriore — for an action completed before another future action, and, surprisingly often, to make educated guesses about the past.
- Il Futuro Semplice: OverviewA2 — Italian's simple future — uniform endings across all three conjugation classes, one orthographic trap to avoid, and a surprising secondary use for guessing about the present.
- Futuro Semplice: Regular VerbsA2 — How to conjugate regular -are, -ere, and -ire verbs in the simple future — and how to navigate the small but unforgiving orthographic gymnastics of the -are class.
- Futuro Semplice: Irregular StemsA2 — The closed list of about 25 Italian verbs with irregular future stems — organized by pattern, learnable in an afternoon, and reusable in the conditional.
- Passato Prossimo with AvereA1 — How to form the passato prossimo with avere as auxiliary — including the one situation where the participle suddenly starts agreeing with something it normally ignores: a preceding direct-object pronoun.
- Passato Prossimo with EssereA1 — The smaller but inescapable group of verbs that take essere as auxiliary — motion, change of state, occurrence — and the visible subject agreement that makes the participle change for every person.