To connect the past to now, English uses the present perfect. 'I ___ here for ten years (and still do).' Which fits?

"Have lived" uses the present perfect tense, which English reserves specifically for actions or states that began in the past and continue into the present. Saying "I have lived here for ten years" signals that the living arrangement started a decade ago and is still ongoing right now.

"Am living" describes an action happening currently without specifying duration from a past starting point, so it doesn't capture the "for ten years" timeline as naturally. "Lived" (simple past) would actually imply the living has ended and you no longer reside there, contradicting the sentence's parenthetical "and still do."

The present perfect is one of the trickiest tenses for learners of many other languages precisely because it bridges past and present in a way many languages express differently, often using a simple past tense where English insists on this distinct in-between form.