A reported question tells someone what another person asked, without quoting the original words. The shape of the sentence changes in a specific way: the question turns into a statement.
English has two question types, and each is reported differently.
Both examples drop the question mark, drop the auxiliary do, and put the subject before the verb. That pattern is the heart of this lesson.
Yes/no questions
A yes/no question expects yes or no as an answer: Do you speak French? Is it raining? Have you finished? To report it, introduce the reported clause with if or whether, then write the rest in statement word order.
| DIRECT | REPORTED |
|---|---|
| "Do you speak French?" | She asked if I spoke French. |
| "Is it raining?" | He asked whether it was raining. |
| "Have you finished?" | Maria asked if I had finished. |
| "Can you drive?" | They asked whether I could drive. |
The auxiliary do/does/did disappears completely. Tense shifts back one step, the same way it does in reported statements: speak → spoke, is → was, have finished → had finished.
Wh-questions
A wh-question starts with a question word — what, where, when, why, who, whose, which, how. In the reported version, the wh-word stays at the front, and the rest of the clause reads as a statement.
| DIRECT | REPORTED |
|---|---|
| "Where do you live?" | Daniel asked where I lived. |
| "What time does the train leave?" | She asked what time the train left. |
| "Why is he upset?" | I wondered why he was upset. |
| "How did you find out?" | He asked how I had found out. |
| "Who called you?" | She asked who had called me. |
As in yes/no questions, do/does/did drops out and the remaining verb carries the tense. Does the train leave becomes simply the train left.
The word-order trap
This is the single most common mistake with reported questions, so it deserves its own block. In English, a direct question uses inversion: the auxiliary comes before the subject (Where are you going?). A reported question uses statement order: subject before verb (where you were going).
Three things change at once when you report a question:
- No inversion. The subject goes back in front of the verb.
- No do/does/did. The tense lives in the main verb.
- No question mark. A reported question is a statement about a question.
The fastest mental check: after the wh-word or if/whether, would the clause work as a normal statement if you removed the reporting verb? I lived in Berlin works. Did I live in Berlin doesn't.
If and whether
For yes/no questions, if and whether are usually interchangeable.
In practice, if is more common in speech and informal writing. Whether sounds a little more formal and is the natural choice in three situations:
- Before or not: He asked whether or not I agreed. (You can also split it: whether I agreed or not.)
- When the question offers a choice: She asked whether I wanted tea or coffee.
- After a preposition or at the start of a reported clause that works as a subject: The question of whether we should continue came up.
The second type is worth highlighting. If the original question presents two options, whether fits better than if:
Reporting verbs
Ask is the default verb for reporting questions. A few others follow the same pattern:
- wonder — the speaker is thinking, not necessarily speaking out loud: I wondered where she had gone.
- want to know — slightly more direct than ask: She wanted to know when the meeting started.
- inquire / enquire — formal, typical in written or polite contexts: He enquired whether the position was still open.
Only ask can take a direct object — the person being asked:
Both He asked where I lived and He asked me where I lived are correct. The version with an object is more common when the listener matters to the story. Wonder, want to know, and inquire do not take a personal object in the same way — I wondered him why is wrong.
Common mistakes
Question word order
Leftover do/does/did
Question mark on a reported question
Missing if/whether in yes/no questions
Wrong reporting verb structure