Choosing between 把 and 被
Two camera angles on one event. The noun after 把 is the thing affected; the noun after 被 is the doer.
结构
施事 + 把 + 受事 + 动词 + 其他 ⇄ 受事 + 被 + （施事）+ 动词 + 其他
讲解
本文中的中文词语都可以激活，查看词典释义。
and are two camera angles on one event. keeps the camera on and says what he did to the cup. keeps it on the cup and says what happened to it. Nothing about who did what has changed — only what the sentence is about.
The mechanical test is short: the noun after is the thing affected; the noun after is the doer. Getting them the wrong way round makes the sentence say the opposite of what you mean — has the cup breaking the boy.
What they share: the affected thing must be definite; the verb must be followed by something (, a complement, a place phrase); negation and adverbs go in front of ／ — , .
Where they part company. needs a doer as its subject and cannot leave it out; can drop the doer altogether: . is the normal way to give an instruction — — while never appears in a request. And leans towards outcomes the speaker did not want, whereas is neutral on that point.
Choosing in practice: if you are telling someone what to do with something, or reporting what you did to it, use . If the affected thing is what you are talking about, or the doer is unknown, use . If neither applies, an ordinary sentence is usually the most natural Chinese: .
正确
Say each one out loud before moving on. The audio is a reference pronunciation, not a model to imitate exactly — match the tone contour, not the voice.
弟弟把杯子打破了。
Dìdi (fourth tone, falling) bǎ (third tone, dipping) bēizi (first tone, high and level) dǎpò (third tone, dipping) le. (neutral tone)···
My little brother broke the cup.
杯子被弟弟打破了。
Bēizi (first tone, high and level) bèi (fourth tone, falling) dìdi (fourth tone, falling) dǎpò (third tone, dipping) le. (neutral tone)···
The cup was broken by my little brother.
他把电脑修好了，可是手机被他弄坏了。他把電腦修好了，可是手機被他弄壞了。
Tā (first tone, high and level) bǎ (third tone, dipping) diànnǎo (fourth tone, falling) xiūhǎo (first tone, high and level) le, (neutral tone) kěshì (third tone, dipping) shǒujī (third tone, dipping) bèi (fourth tone, falling) tā (first tone, high and level) nònghuài (fourth tone, falling) le. (neutral tone)···
He fixed the computer, but the phone ended up broken in his hands.
错误 — 常见错误
These sentences are wrong. They are printed here on purpose, each one paired with the repair and the reason, because the error you can recognise is the error you stop making.
不太对
Incorrect sentence: 杯子把弟弟打破了。
正确
Correct sentence: 杯子被弟弟打破了。
为什么: After 把 comes the thing affected, so this says the cup broke the boy. When the affected thing is the subject, the word you need is 被.
不太对
Incorrect sentence: 请被窗户关上。
正确
Correct sentence: 请把窗户关上。
为什么: Instructions are always given with 把. 被 reports what happened to something and cannot be used to ask someone to act.
不太对
Incorrect sentence: 我被作业写完了。
正确
Correct sentence: 我把作业写完了。
为什么: You are the one doing the writing, so the pattern is 把. 我被… would mean something was done to you.
对比
Most errors with this pattern are not errors about this pattern — they are a neighbouring pattern arriving at the wrong moment. Read these side by side.
把 answers “what did you do to it?”, so it always needs a doer in the subject slot. If your sentence has no doer — because nobody knows who broke the cup, or it does not matter — 把 is simply not available, and 被 is: 杯子被打破了. Learners who have just met 把 tend to force it into these sentences and produce 杯子把打破了, which leaves 把 with nothing to introduce.
The 把 construction →被 answers “what happened to it?” and can drop the doer, which makes it tempting for every English passive. But a 被 sentence still needs the verb to carry a result — 被偷了, 被打破了 — and it still cannot be used for requests. When you are giving an instruction, the same event has to be put in 把: 请把杯子放好, never 请被杯子放好. And when nothing has gone wrong and no one is being singled out, plain word order beats both: 我洗了杯子.
The 被 passive →小测验
第 1 题 / 3总分: 0
Which sentence means “My little brother broke the cup”?