Hi there. My name is Emma, and today we are going to be looking at a very, very common
English grammar mistake. "Lie" or "lay". Now, this is a mistake that not only do ESL
students make, but native speakers make a lot as well. Before I became an ESL teacher,
I had a lot of problems with this specific grammar point. I remember even searching for
this online when I was, like, in high school. So this is something that native speakers
should look at, too. And if you ever ask a native speaker, "What's the difference between
these two words?" I bet you a lot of the time, they'll have trouble telling you. And I will
explain why this is so commonly confused in a moment.
So to get started, let's look at the word "lay". Okay? So this is a verb, "to lay",
and it means to put something down. Oftentimes, we have it with the preposition following
on something. So, for example, if I put the marker down on the table, I could say, "I
lay the marker down." Okay? Or, "I lay the marker in my hand." So it's when you put something
down oftentimes on something. So one of the problems that people have with
the word "lay" is when they use it in the past tense or present perfect, when they use
it in the past participle, they get very, very confused. So let's go over that. So "lay"
is the present tense. "I lay the marker on the table." "Laid", so "laid", again, it's
irregular, not -ed ending. This is the past tense. "Yesterday, I laid the marker on the
table." And finally, "laid" is just like the past tense for our past participle. If we're
using the present perfect, I could say, "I have laid my marker on the table." So "lay",
"laid", "laid". And this is something you're going to have to memorize, so just practice.
So let's look at some examples to better understand the word "lay". Number one, "I lay my head
on the pillow." So again, this means I put -- what's the something? -- my head on the
pillow. So one way to remember "lay" is that there always has to be an object. What do
I mean by that? Well, in this sentence, we have the subject, "I", we have the verb, "lay",
and after the verb, there always has to be something or someone. So in this case, my
head is the something. I can call this the object. So I can't just say, "I lay" or "I
laid", "I've laid". No, you need an object, you need something following the sentence.
So, "I lay my head on the pillow." And again, we often use the preposition "on something"
So number two, I have "lay" in the past tense, the simple past. "I laid my books on the floor."
So again, this just means I put something down, in this case, on the floor. What did
I put down? I put down "my books". "I laid my books on the floor." So again, we have
the subject, "I", "laid" is the verb, and like I was saying, you always need an object
with "lay". An object being something or someone. So in this case, the object, "my books". I
could say, "I laid the pen on the floor." "I laid clothes on the floor." There always
has to be something, always an object.
So number three, in this case, we're using the present perfect. "I've laid dinner on
the table." Meaning, there's a table, and I put dinner down on the table. So in this
case, what's the subject? "I", what's the verb? "Have laid", and what's the object?
"Dinner". So this is almost like a mathematical formula you can remember. Any time you use
"lay", you need a verb and an object. Okay? You always need an object.
So now, let's look at "lie" and compare the two. Okay, so let's look at the word "lie".
So "lie", it means "to rest" or "recline", and "recline" means kind of "lay back". Oftentimes,
we recline on a chair, in bed. So here's a picture to give you a better idea. This is
a man who is resting in bed. He's lying in bed.
So one of the things that is very confusing with the word "lie" is in the present form,
"lie", it has two meanings. So just like what I told you, it means "to rest" or "recline",
another definition of "lie" is "to not tell the truth". So for example, "I lie all the
time." It's not true. That actually was just a lie. But so it has two meanings.
Additionally, "lie" gets very confusing because this is in the present tense. In the past
tense, it becomes "lay". So this is why English speakers confuse these all the time, and you
will often hear English speakers make mistakes with these. "Lay" is the present tense that
we talked about before. It's also, in this case, the past tense of the verb "lie".
If I was talking about an untruth and not telling the truth, the past tense of that
verb would be "ed", so "lied". It's just a regular "ed" verb, whereas "lie", in this
case, "lay", "lain", it's irregular. And "lain", again, is the past participle. We would use
something like this with maybe the present perfect.
So "lie", "lay", "lain". So repeat after me, "lie", "lay", "lain". This is something that
just has to be memorized, unfortunately. There's no grammatical rule, it's just something you
So let's get started to understand "lie" better. We won't be talking about "lie" meaning not
telling the truth. We're going to be talking about it meaning "rest" and "reclining". Let's
look at the first example. "My dog lies in front of me." It means my dog is resting,
he's lying down in front of me. So, "My dog lies in front of me." So what do you notice
about this? Do you see an object? Well, we have our subject here, "my dog", we have the
verb, "lies". Does my dog lie something or someone? No, there's no object. This is a
preposition, not an object, "in front of me". So I can't say, "My dog lies my hand" or "My
dog lies my painting", "My dog lies my feet". These do not make any sense. We can only have
a subject and a verb. There cannot be an object after the verb "lie". So this is the main
difference between "lay" and "lie".
Okay, number two. So now we're looking at "lie" in the past tense. So I hope you're
following this because this is very easy to confuse. We're not looking at this "lay" which
means something different from "lie" to "rest" or "recline". So in this case, we're looking
at the past tense of "lie". "I lay in my bed." So just like this person's doing, they're
reclining or resting in their bed. "I lay in my bed." Again, "I", the subject, "lay"
is the verb. Is there an object? No. So no object, instead we just have the preposition
"in my bed". So oftentimes with "lie", you lie in something or on something. So that's
common, but you don't have an object following.
Okay, number three. "I've lain in a hammock before." Now this is something you probably
will not hear too often because like I was saying, native speakers often confuse "lain"
with "laid". So even though this is the correct one, you may not hear it too frequently. So
in this case, we have the subject, "I", the verb, so past participle, "lain", "I've lain".
Again, we have "in", "in" or "on" usually follows, "a hammock". So for those of you
who don't know what a hammock is, during the summertime, these are very popular. They're
something to sleep in, to take a nap in. So usually, you have two posts and you have maybe
some sort of material and you just lie on it. Sometimes, you hang a hammock between
two trees. So, "I've lain in a hammock before." So in this case, we're using the present perfect.
Okay, so now let's do a comparison. Let's do some questions looking at both "lie" and
Okay, so before we do some questions with "lie" or "lay", I have a very important note
for you in bright red so you remember. "Get laid" means sex. Now, the reason I bring this
up is because I don't want any of you to confuse "get laid" with "lay" or "lie" because that
could be very, very embarrassing. So be careful with this. If you have the "get" in front,
this means sex, just so you're aware of that slang term.
So let's begin. One, "Please the bill on the table." Do you think it's "lie" as in rest
or recline or "lay" as in put something down? "Please lay the bill on the table." This is
"lay" present tense, and it means to put down. And how did I know? In this case, we don't
have a subject. We have our verb, "lay", and we have an object, which is the bill. So the
verb is followed by something.
Okay, number two, "You look sick. Lie down" or "lay down"? "You look sick. Lie down."
So this means rest or lie flat in a reclining position. How did I know this was "lie down"?
Well, there was no object. Nothing came after it, so it has to be "lie".
Number three, "I need to" in a bed, not get laid. "I need to lie" or "lay". "I need to
lie." So in this case, it's "lie". How do I know? There's no object. I'm not saying
"lie something". We do have a preposition here, like I said before, but we do not have
an object. "I need to lie", "I need to lie down", "I need to lie in" or "on" something.
Finally, number four, "The dinner was" on the table. "The dinner was" -- do you think
it's going to be "lie" or "lay"? In which form? "The dinner was laid on the table."
This last one was a little bit difficult because we're using the passive tense. If you had
trouble with this one, don't worry about it. For more practice, I welcome you to visit
our website where we'll look at all of these in both easy and more difficult questions.
Our website, again, is www.engvid.com. Until next time, take care.