student asking question

What does "could have + p.p" mean?

teacher

Native speaker’s answer

Rebecca

We generally use could have + past participle when we want to make a guess about something that happened in the past. This is used when we don't know if what we're saying is true or not true. We're just talking about our opinion of what maybe happened. Ex: A: Why is Kate late? B: She could have forgotten we were meeting today.

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