The future perfect tense is used to talk about situations that will have been completed by a certain point of time in the future.

Form: will have + past participle form of the verb

Read the example sentences given below.

• I’m saving money to buy a flat. By the end of this year, I will have saved enough to buy one.
• My children will be spending their holidays in our native village. My husband and I will be on a pilgrimage during that period. We will have finished our tour by the time the holidays end.

The future perfect tense is almost always used with an adverbial phrase or clause that expresses a point of time in the future. Examples are: by evening, by the end of this month, by the end of this year etc. At that points of time in the future, these events will be ‘past’ or finished.

• By the end of this year, Dr. Mehta will have worked in this hospital for twenty-five years.
• She will have returned home by midnight.
• By the end of 2015, I will have paid off my home loan.
• By the time you reach the railway station, the train will have left.
• I will have finished my studies by the end of next year.

A future perfect continuous form can be used to emphasize the continuity of a future achievement.

• Dr. Mehta will have been working in this hospital for twenty-five years by the end of this year.