Been vs gone (present perfect)

The verb go has two participles, gone and been. The use of gone or been depends on the meaning of the sentence.

My brother has gone to London – My brother is in London now.
My brother has been to London – My brother has visited London, but he’s not in London now.

Pay attention to the fact that been is followed by the preposition to in this use. It is the use of present perfect to talk about experiences, which is similar to Spanish (He estado en Londres=Conozco Londres).

The English You Need blog has published the activity below to help you discriminate between been and gone.

On a future entry we will be dealing with the difference in meaning between been to and been in in the present perfect.