English UsageComparison guide

Find Someone Doing vs. Find Someone Do

Find can take an object plus an -ing form to describe the state or activity discovered. The corresponding object + bare-infinitive form is not the ordinary construction for this meaning.

Reviewed2026-09-27Evidence1 sourceSectionEnglish Usage

Quick answer

Use “find someone doing” when you discover a person engaged in an activity; bare “find someone do” is not the normal parallel construction in this sense.

Key details

Confusion Familygrammar-and-usage distinction

Rule Familyverb-complement and object pattern

TermsFind Someone Doing, Find Someone Do

Choose the right form

Decision table for Find Someone Doing vs. Find Someone Do
Meaning / situation	Form / construction	Decision
discover someone engaged in an activity	find + person + -ing	Use the documented object + -ing construction.
discover a state or condition	use the complement that expresses that state	Do not force a bare infinitive merely because another perception verb allows one.

Quick tests

Meaning / construction test

Do you mean that you discovered someone while that person was engaged in the activity?

If yes: Use “find someone doing.”

If no: Choose a different “find” construction for a different meaning; bare “find someone do” is not the normal parallel form here.

Caveat: Oxford documents “find + somebody/something + doing”; “find” has other complement patterns, so this rule is limited to the discover-someone-engaged-in-an-activity sense.

Examples

Example

I found Leo waiting outside.

The -ing form presents the activity in progress when Leo was found.

Example

They found the children playing quietly.

Object + -ing describes the activity discovered.

Example

We found the door unlocked.

A different complement is used when the discovered result is a state rather than an activity.

Further guidance

Boundary

Find has many other complement patterns, including object complements and clauses; this guide is only about the discover-someone-engaged-in-an-activity construction.

Construction

Oxford documents find + somebody/something + doing as a standard pattern.

Decision

Choose find someone doing for discovering an ongoing activity; if you mean something else, use a construction that matches that different sense instead of forcing a bare infinitive.

Sources and evidence

Sources are shown with the role they play in this guide. Historical or style-sensitive claims are kept within the evidence boundary described above.

find — Oxford Learner’s Dictionaries (opens in a new tab)Oxford Learner’s Dictionaries · Direct find + object + -ing pattern and related find constructions

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