Past Tense of “feel”
The past tense of feel is felt; the past participle is felt.
Why “feel” behaves this way
"Feel" comes from Old English "felan," a weak verb whose past tense shortened the long vowel and added the dental "-t" ending typical of weak verbs, producing "felt" — the same general shortening-plus-dental-suffix pattern seen in "keep/kept," "sleep/slept," and "mean/meant," all weak verbs whose long vowels shortened specifically in the past tense while the base form kept its longer sound.
This whole family of long-vowel-shortening weak verbs is sometimes grouped by linguists as a coherent subclass distinct from both the fully regular -ed verbs and the ablaut-based strong verbs — they're technically "weak" (they use a dental suffix, not a vowel-grade change, to mark the past) but their vowel shortening still makes them feel irregular to modern speakers who no longer recognize the historical sound rule behind it.
The common confusion
There's little genuine confusion over the irregular form, but "feel bad" vs. "feel badly" is a related, commonly debated point: "feel" functions here as a linking verb describing a state, so the adjective "bad" is grammatically correct ("I feel bad about it"), while "feel badly" technically describes a malfunctioning sense of touch — a distinction most usage guides now treat as fading, since "feel badly" is widely accepted as a synonym for "feel bad" in casual speech.
How it's actually used
"Feel" functions as a stative linking verb (describing an emotional or physical state, "I feel tired") far more often than as a dynamic action verb (describing active touching, "feel the fabric") in everyday usage, which is why "feel" resists the progressive in its most common sense ("I am feeling tired" is acceptable but slightly marked; "I feel tired" is the more neutral default) — the opposite pattern from most ordinary action verbs. "Feel" also combines with "like" in two distinct patterns worth telling apart: "feel like a fool" (a simile, comparing yourself to something) versus "feel like eating" (expressing a desire or inclination) — both grammatically valid but semantically unrelated uses of the same two-word combination, which can confuse learners who've only encountered one of the two.
Across the tense system
The perfect tenses of "feel" ("has felt," "had felt") commonly describe an emotional state that persisted over a stretch of time rather than a single momentary sensation — "she had felt uneasy for weeks before finally saying something" — a durative use that pairs naturally with "felt" even though the verb itself doesn't change form to signal that duration.
Common real mistakes
"I am feeling that..." used to introduce an opinion ("I am feeling that we should wait") is a common non-native pattern; standard English prefers the simple present for this stative, opinion-giving sense ("I feel that we should wait"), reserving the progressive for genuinely ongoing physical or emotional sensations. A separate, purely spelling-based error is writing "felt" as "felled" or "feeled" by analogy with regular -ed verbs, a mistake seen mostly in early learner writing before the weak-but-irregular felt/kept/slept family has been fully internalized as its own small, consistent pattern rather than a set of unrelated exceptions. A further mix-up is "feel" versus "think" when introducing an opinion — some usage guides distinguish "I feel that..." (an emotional or intuitive judgment) from "I think that..." (a reasoned judgment), though in casual usage the two are now largely interchangeable as opinion-introducers, a shift some formal style guides still resist.
Examples
- I felt a sudden chill in the room.
- She has felt this way for months.
- We felt relieved when the results came back.
- He feels strongly about this issue.
- They had felt uneasy about the plan from the start.
- It would have felt strange to say no.
- I feel like we've met before.
- She's feeling much better today.
Memory trick
Group "feel" with "keep" and "sleep": all three are weak verbs, and all three clip a long vowel short before tacking on a plain -t for the past tense (kept, slept) — no ancient vowel-swap involved, just an old sound shortening. Keep the two "feel like" patterns mentally separate: "feel like a fool" is a comparison, while "feel like eating" expresses a want — same two words, two unrelated jobs.