⚡ Quick summary
Swim is an irregular verb. Swim is the base form, which can be used in the present tense, the future tense (will swim), and as an infinitive (to swim). Swam is the past tense form, as in I swam in the river an hour ago. Swum is the past participle form, which is used to form the present perfect tense (has/have swum), the past perfect tense (had swum), and in passive voice constructions (as in The 400m race was swum by the Olympic team).
The past tense of swim is swam, and the past participle of swim is swum. Why?
In this article, we will explain how and when to correctly use swim, swam, and swum, explain why swim is considered to be an irregular verb, and provide examples of how we use swim, swam, and swum in sentences.
swam vs. swum
The verb swim is an irregular verb. Swim is the base form of the verb, which can be used in most present tenses (swim, swims), most future tenses (will swim), and as an infinitive (to swim).
For example:
- She swims laps in the pool as part of her workout routine.
- Chris will swim the last leg of the relay.
- Salmon need to swim upstream in order to reach spawning locations.
A verb is typically considered to be irregular if its past tense or past participle is formed without using the standard –ed or –d endings used in regular verbs (parked, dated). This is the case with swim. Instead of swimmed, the past tense is swam.
For example:
- The deer swam across the river to escape the cougar.
- We swam out to the dock and back again in record time.
- When my sister swam at swim meets, she always came in first.
The past participle of swim is swum. Past participles are preceded by helping, or auxiliary, verbs, such as have, has, and had.
For example:
- My dog has swum in the pool a few times before.
- Dolphins have swum by the pier for as long as I can remember.
- After I had swum a mile, I was ready to get out of the pool.
Like other past participles, swum is also the form used in the passive voice. Here, too, the irregular verb is preceded by a form of the helping verb be.
For example:
- The world record race was swum by a French swimmer.
- The final legs of the races were swum by the fastest swimmers.
Verbs similar to swim
No other verb follows the exact conjugation pattern of swim. Other verbs ending in -im, such as trim, skim, and dim, are usually regular verbs. However, several other irregular verbs follow a similar spelling change pattern to swim, in which an i changes to an a in the past tense and to a u when used as a past participle.
| present tense | past tense | past participle |
| swim | swam | swum |
| ring | rang | rung |
| sing | sang | sung |
| spring | sprang | sprung |
| sink | sank | sunk |
| stink | stank | stunk |
| drink | drank | drunk |
| begin | began | begun |
Examples of swim, swam, and swum used in a sentence
Let’s dive into some example sentences that show how we typically use swim, swam, and swum.
- Gorillas don’t know how to swim.
- We swim at the beach every summer.
- The seals swam away from the lurking shark.
- Blake had swum two laps before anyone else swam one.
- Tiffany has already swum in the lake this morning, Lance swam in it during the afternoon, and Aaron will swim with Chase tonight.
