Grammar › Time › 〜たことがある
〜たことがある
"I've done it before." How Japanese talks about experience — the fact that a thing has, at some point, happened to you at least once.
The short version
Take the past (た) form of a verb, add ことがある — literally "there is a time (I) did X". 食べたことがある = "I've eaten it (before)". For "never", swap ある for ない: 食べたことがない.
食べる → 食べたことがある — I've eaten it before
食べたことがない — I've never eaten it
"Have you ever…?"
The polite ことがありますか is the standard way to ask about someone's experience — "have you ever done X?".
食べたことがありますか。
Have you ever eaten it? (asking about experience)
桜を見たことがありますか。
Have you ever seen cherry blossoms? (を見た + ことがある)
Casually — たことある
Among friends the が drops out and です／ます disappears, leaving a quick たことある?.
Watch out
Experience, not just past tense. 食べた = "I ate (it)", a specific past event. 食べたことがある = "I've had the experience of eating it". Use ことがある for notable, occasional experiences — not for "I ate breakfast this morning" or things you do all the time.
🗣 〜たことがあった shifts it into the past. The plain ある points to now ("I have that experience"); 昔はよく…たことがあった leans toward "there was a time I used to…" — an experience that belongs to an earlier stretch of your life.
Next: 〜たり〜たり — do such things as → · とき — when → · All grammar
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