被 (bèi) lets you start with the person or thing affected by an action: 我的自行车被小林修好了。 (Wǒ de zì xíng chē bèi Xiǎo Lín xiū hǎo le.), “My bicycle has been repaired by Xiao Lin.” The bicycle stays in the spotlight, and what follows explains what happened to it.
That is good news. Although 被 often appears with unwanted events, it is not a grammatical signal that something must be bad.
One bicycle, two ways to tell the story
These are constructed teaching examples, not quotations from real conversations.
小林修好了我的自行车。Xiǎo Lín xiū hǎo le wǒ de zì xíng chē.
Xiao Lin has repaired my bicycle.
This is a useful answer to “What did Xiao Lin do?” Now imagine someone asks about your broken bicycle:
我的自行车被小林修好了。Wǒ de zì xíng chē bèi Xiǎo Lín xiū hǎo le.
My bicycle has been repaired by Xiao Lin.
The event is the same; the starting point changes. For this straightforward pattern, use affected person/thing + 被 + agent + action and its development. The agent is whoever or whatever causes the action. Do not put the bicycle after the verb again: it already occupies the opening position.
Keep the result, not just the verb
修好 (xiū hǎo) means to repair successfully. Here 好 describes the result; 了 presents the completed event. We are not merely naming the activity “repair.”
In a standalone report, a bare verb after 被 often leaves the listener waiting for more. Give the relevant result, completion, or other detail. This does not mean every passive must end in 了. Compare 我不想被打扰。 (Wǒ bù xiǎng bèi dǎ rǎo.), “I don't want to be disturbed.” No completed event is being reported. Our guide to 了 and past time explains why 了 is not a past-tense ending.
When the agent does not matter
我的自行车被修好了。Wǒ de zì xíng chē bèi xiū hǎo le.
My bicycle has been repaired.
You can omit Xiao Lin if the conversation concerns the bicycle's condition rather than the repairer. The authored grammar lesson by Lina Shen also covers this agentless pattern. You do not have to invent a vague “someone” just to fill the slot after 被.
Bad news is common, not compulsory
她被老师表扬了。Tā bèi lǎo shī biǎo yáng le.
She was praised by the teacher.
This makes her experience the point of the sentence. In an EdUHK-hosted linguistics paper, Andy C. Chin explicitly notes favorable Mandarin 被 examples in footnote 17. The paper mainly concerns Cantonese; that Mandarin comparison is the relevant part here.
Do not swing to the opposite extreme and insert 被 into every positive English passive. Whether the action is worth presenting as something that happened to the subject still matters. 会议被取消了。 (Huì yì bèi qǔ xiāo le.), “The meeting was cancelled,” reports a change; whether the speaker welcomes it is a separate question.
Put the negative before 被
自行车没被偷走。Zì xíng chē méi bèi tōu zǒu.
The bicycle was not stolen.
没 negates the event here and comes before 被. Do not move it between the named agent and the verb when forming this model. There is no completed-event 了 at the end. This is different from the earlier 不想 sentence, which negates a desire. See 不 versus 没 for that distinction.
Sometimes you do not need a passive marker
门修好了。 (Mén xiū hǎo le.) can simply announce, “The door is fixed.” 门开着。 (Mén kāi zhe.), “The door is open,” describes a state. Neither needs 被 just because English uses “is.” Contrast the event 门被风吹开了。 (Mén bèi fēng chuī kāi le.), “The door was blown open by the wind.”
The University of Washington's supplementary grammar notes distinguish several Chinese ways of expressing meanings that English puts into passive form. Our 在 versus 着 guide develops the event/state distinction.
Try describing a parcel your roommate collected: 快递被室友拿走了。 (Kuài dì bèi shì yǒu ná zǒu le.), “The parcel was taken away by my roommate.” Then ask yourself: am I talking about the parcel, or reporting what my roommate did? That choice is more useful than translating “was” into 被 automatically.
Common questions
Must the agent be a person?
No. In the door example, the wind causes the action. Check the roles rather than looking only for a human name.
Can 叫 and 让 replace 被 everywhere?
No. They have other uses and different restrictions. In particular, do not use them as drop-in replacements for the agentless pattern taught here. Learn 被 first, then compare their conversational uses in context.
Is passive word order different in traditional characters?
No. The script switch changes forms such as 车 and 扬, not these basic Mandarin sentence roles. This article is about Mandarin, not a claim that Cantonese uses identical constructions.
