Is have a verb?

Yes, “have” is a verb. It has many meanings, most of which relate to possession or relationship (e.g., “I have a blue car;” “She has two sisters”).

“Have” is an irregular verb, which means its past tense is not formed with “-ed.” Instead, the simple past tense and past participle form is “had” (e.g., “I had a dog when I was a child”).

“Have” can also act as an auxiliary verb (aka helping verb) to form perfect verb tenses:

Tense Example
Present perfect I have eaten
Past perfect I had eaten
Future perfect I will have eaten
Present perfect progressive (present perfect continuous) I have been eating
Past perfect progressive I had been eating
Future perfect progressive I will have been eating

“Have” is also used as an auxiliary verb in certain conditional sentences (e.g., “If I had known you were coming, I would have bought groceries”).

QuillBot’s Grammar Checker can help you make sure you’re using “have” correctly.