"Likely To" + Infinitive vs "It Is Likely That" + Clause
5 exercises — practise the two structures for hedged predictions with "likely".
0 / 5 completed
1 / 5
Which sentence correctly uses "likely to" with the subject that will perform the action?
"The migration is likely to take longer than the estimate" is correct: "[subject] + be likely to + bare infinitive" attaches the prediction directly to the subject performing the action. Option B incorrectly tries to combine the impersonal "it is likely to" pattern with a separate subject and verb, which is not grammatical. Option C mixes "likely to" with a "that"-clause, which the "likely to" pattern does not take. Option D incorrectly follows "likely" with "for + gerund", which is not a valid structure for this adjective.
2 / 5
Which sentence correctly uses the impersonal "it is likely that" pattern with a full clause?
"It is likely that the vendor will patch this vulnerability within a week" is correct: "it is likely that + subject + finite verb" is the standard impersonal pattern, here paired with "will" for a future prediction. Option B incorrectly mixes the impersonal "it is likely" opener with the "likely to" infinitive pattern's subject placement. Option C incorrectly uses "for + gerund" after "likely", which is not a valid structure. Option D incorrectly attaches "that" directly after "is likely" with the real subject already in front, producing a double-subject structure.
3 / 5
Which sentence correctly rewrites "It is likely that the service will time out" using the "likely to" pattern with the same meaning?
"The service is likely to time out" correctly transforms the sentence: the real subject ("the service") moves to subject position, followed by "is likely to" plus the bare infinitive, preserving the original meaning. Option B incorrectly keeps "that" after moving the subject, mixing both patterns. Option C incorrectly uses a gerund ("timing out") instead of the required infinitive after "likely to". Option D omits the auxiliary "is", which "likely to" requires as part of the adjective phrase ("be likely to").
4 / 5
Which sentence correctly uses "likely to" to hedge a prediction about a specific metric behaving a certain way?
"Error rates are likely to spike during the flash sale window" is correct: the plural subject "error rates" takes "are likely to" plus the bare infinitive "spike". Option B incorrectly adds "that" after "likely", which does not belong in the "likely to" pattern. Option C incorrectly places "error rates" after "it is likely", conflating the two patterns' subject positions. Option D is missing the auxiliary "are" and uses a gerund instead of the required bare infinitive.
5 / 5
Which sentence correctly uses "it is likely that" when the prediction concerns a whole situation rather than one clear grammatical subject performing an action?
"It is likely that both root causes contributed to the outage simultaneously" is correct and natural here, since the prediction is about a whole compound situation (two causes acting together) rather than a single agent performing one action, which favors the impersonal "it is likely that" clause. Option B incorrectly inserts "that" into the "likely to" pattern. Option C garbles the verb form and misplaces "that". Option D incorrectly mixes "it is likely" with an infinitive clause instead of the required "that"-clause.