Modals for Permission

To talk about permission we used the verbs: can, could, may and be allowed to.

Be allowed to is not a modal verb.

To talk about permission is the present we use: can, may or be allowed to.

Be allowed to is more formal than can.

May is formal than be allowed to and can.

The table below shows how to use these verbs.

	Can	Be allowed to	May
Yes/No Question	Can I smoke here?	Am I allowed to smoke here?	May I smoke here?
Yes/no Answer	Yes, you can. No, you can't	Yes, you are. No, you aren't.	Yes, you may. No, you may not.
Question word question	Where can I smoke?	Where am I allowed to smoke?	Where may I smoke?
Positive Response	You can smoke here.	You are allowed to smoke here.	You may smoke here.
Negative Response	You can’t smoke here.	You aren’t allowed to smoke here.	You may not smoke here.

It is also possible to use could to ask for permission in the present. This is more polite than can.

Can I ask you a question?

Could I ask you a question?

To talk about permission is the past we use: could and was allowed to.

	Could	Was Allowed to
Yes/No Question	Could you wear casual clothes in your last job?	Were you allowed to wear casual clothes in your last job?
Yes/no Answer	Yes, I could. No, I couldn't.	Yes, I was. No, I wasn't.
Question word question	What could you wear?	What were you allowed to wear?
Positive Response	I could wear casual clothes.	I was allowed to wear casual clothes.
Negative Response	I couldn’t wear casual clothes.	I wasn’t allowed to wear casual clothes.

Click on the links below to learn more about modal verbs