Past Tense Of Pry: Pried or Pryed? (Pronunciation & Usage)

What Is The Past Tense Of Pry?

The pry past tense is pried. Pry is a regular verb, so its V2 form follows the rule of past tense verbs ending in -ed. To get the V2 form of pry, you can omit the letter -d and add -ed at the end of the word.

Although the V3 form of pry is the same as the V2’s, the past participle form always needs to be followed by auxiliary verbs (have, has, or had) to indicate an action in a sequence but not happen in the present anymore.

According to Collins Dictionary, there are other verb conjugations of pry, such as pries (3rd person singular present tense), prying (the present participle), and pries (past participle). You can take a glimpse at the table below for more details.

Simple Present	He/She/It pries I/You/We/They pry
Present Continuous	He/She/It is prying I am prying You/We/They are prying
Present Perfect	He/She/It has pried I/You/We/They have pried
Present Perfect Continuous	He/She/It has been prying I/You/We/They have been prying
Simple Past	He/She/It/I/You/We/They pried
Past Continuous	I/He/She/It was prying You/We/They were prying
Past Perfect	He/She/It/I/You/We/They had pried
Past Perfect Continuous	He/She/It/I/You/We/They had been prying
Simple Future	He/She/It/I/You/We/They will/shall pry
Future Continuous	He/She/It/I/You/We/They will/shall be prying
Future Perfect	He/She/It/I/You/We/They will/shall have pried
Future Perfect Continuous	He/She/It/I/You/We/They will/shall have been prying

How do you spell pry and pried as naturally and correctly as native speakers? The below videos may help you to pronounce them exactly.

How to say pry: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pqdGzXlpg7Q 

How to say pried: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FZflnXQM3ms 

Pronunciation

According to the Oxford dictionary, the IPA transcription of pry is /praɪ/, and of pried is /praɪd/. You can watch the table below to make it clearer.

Form of word	Pronunciation
	US	UK
pry	/praɪ/	/praɪ/
pried	/praɪd/	/praɪd/
pried	/praɪd/	/praɪd/

Definitions And How To Use Pried?

What is the pry definition? The English verb pry has 2 following meanings:

• Pry (into something): to try to find out about something that is secret, especially other people’s affairs, in a way that is annoying or offensive

Example: The guy in the river next to my house is unemployed and lazy. Not only does he not work hard, but he also often pries into my business.

• Pry something: open something from a surface/ force it open or away from a surface.

Example: He’s trying to pry a sticky can of pink paint to repaint his little daughter’s room. She likes that everything in the room is decorated in pink, including the blanket, the pillow, the desk, and the cute little wardrobe.

Pried meaning is the same as its basic form. Like the regular past form of other words, the V2 pried is used to talk about the action that happened and was completed in the past. You can check out the examples below to make them clearer.

Examples:

• They have pried personal records from phone companies by posing as reporters for famous TV stations. The staff was fooled and gave them important information.
• I pried the top off a can of chili, but it was too hard, so I asked my brother. He could open it, but because of too much force, the chili in the jar was all over him.
• Yesterday reporters crowded in front of that star’s house and pried into her recent relationships. Not stopping there, they also wanted to know about her income situation. It’s nosy!

Exercises

Choose the correct verb tense to fill in the (a), (b), (c), and (d):

1. They (a) the news out of him for the past week, but his behavior was too cautious about revealing any information. He even left before the press could pick up their camera.

A. pries

B. pry

C. pried

D. prying

(The correct answer: C)

2. He (b) the lid off with a spoon, but the spoon was broken in half. The jam jar had a small hole punched, but he gave up. In the end, my dad had to help him open it.

A. pry

B. pries

C. prying

D. pried

(The correct answer: D)

3. I was paid to interview members of this family. I’ve (c) into the subject’s past, but they don’t seem to want to dig into these issues any further as they are all sensitive issues.

A. pry

B. pried

C. pries

D. prying

(The correct answer: B)

4. Mom: What did you do with my canned fish?

Tom: Yesterday I (d) to make a sandwich but I couldn’t open it.

Mom: There’s a place to pull the lid off. You should read the user manual first to know how to open it.

Tom: Oh! Thanks, Mom.

A. pried

B. pries

C. pry

D. prying

(The correct answer: A)

FAQs

What Are Synonyms And Antonyms Of Pry?

According to Merriam Webster dictionary, pry synonym are corkscrew, extract, prize, pull, root (out), tear (out), uproot, wrest, wring, yank, butt in, interfere, interlope, intermeddle, intrude, meddle, mess, muck (about or around), nose, obtrude, poke, and snoop.

The antonyms of pry are implant, insert, install, instill, cram, jam, ram, stuff, wedge, avoid, eschew, shun, disregard, ignore, neglect, and overlook.

“Pry” Is a Transitive Or Intransitive Verb?

Pry is an intransitive verb. It needs to be followed by an object or prepositions because it cannot make a complete sentence with the subject. For example, he always pries into my assets as well as my relationships with the people around me.

Is Pry A Noun?

Yes. According to the Merriam-webster Dictionary, the noun “pry” is a tool for prying. However, people often use pry as a verb rather than a noun.

Example 1: I need a pry to open this lid. Do you have any pry or a similar tool? I want to see what’s inside, but I can’t open it manually.

Example 2: I bought a pry last week because my wife always complains about prying open metal cans with lids. However, after buying it, she criticized it because this pry can only open small boxes, and large boxes cannot be opened.