Grammar & usage

Rules grouped by category. Each rule explains the point, shows examples, and links to common mistakes and related rules.

Conjugation

Auxiliary selection: avoir vs être Compound tenses use avoir as the auxiliary for most verbs, but être for all pronominal verbs and a small set of intransitive verbs of motion or change of state.
Causative faire (faire + infinitive) Faire + infinitive means to have or make something done by someone else; the two verbs form a block that pronouns and most adverbs cannot split, and the participle fait stays invariable before an infinitive.
Conditionnel passé The conditionnel passé is the French 'would have' form, used for unrealised past possibilities, regret and reproach, and formed with the present conditional of avoir or être plus the past participle.
Present conditional The present conditional expresses what would happen, plus polite requests and hypotheses, and is formed from the future stem with the imperfect endings -ais, -ais, -ait, -ions, -iez, -aient.
Futur antérieur The futur antérieur expresses an action that will be completed before another future moment ('will have done'), formed with the future simple of avoir or être plus the past participle.
Futur simple The futur simple is the one-word future tense used to say what will happen, formed by adding the endings -ai, -as, -a, -ons, -ez, -ont to the infinitive (or an irregular future stem).
Group 1 spelling: -cer / -ger Verbs in -cer change c to ç, and verbs in -ger add a silent e, before the vowels a and o so the soft /s/ and /ʒ/ sounds are preserved, while the ordinary -er endings stay unchanged.
Group 1 stem change: é → è (préférer) Verbs like préférer change the é of the last stem syllable to è before a silent ending, so the stressed vowel opens: je préfère but nous préférons.
Group 1 stem change: e → è / consonant doubling Some -er verbs with a mute e in the last stem syllable strengthen it to an open è-sound before a silent ending, either by writing è (acheter, lever) or by doubling the consonant (appeler, jeter); the device is lexical and learned per verb.
Group 1: regular -er verbs Regular -er verbs form the present by dropping -er from the infinitive and adding the endings -e, -es, -e, -ons, -ez, -ent.
Group 1 spelling: -yer (y to i) Verbs ending in -yer change the y to i before a silent e ending, but keep the y before the pronounced -ons and -ez endings; -ayer verbs may keep either spelling.
Group 2: regular -ir verbs (-iss-, finir) Group 2 verbs end in -ir and insert the infix -iss- in the three plural present forms, following the model of finir.
Group 3: irregular verbs overview Group 3 gathers all the irregular verbs whose stems or endings do not follow the regular -er or -ir (-iss-) patterns.
The three verb groups French verbs are traditionally sorted into three groups by their infinitive ending and how regularly they conjugate: -er (group 1), -ir with -iss- (group 2), and everything irregular (group 3).
Imparfait The imparfait is a past tense for descriptions, habits and ongoing background actions, formed from the nous stem of the present plus the endings -ais, -ais, -ait, -ions, -iez, -aient.
Impératif The imperative is the mood for giving orders, instructions and advice; it exists only in the tu, nous and vous forms, has no subject pronoun, and places object pronouns after the verb in affirmative commands.
Impersonal verbs (falloir, pleuvoir, s'agir) Impersonal verbs exist only with the dummy subject il — never a real person or thing — and cover weather (il pleut), necessity (il faut), and a handful of fixed expressions (il s'agit de, il reste, il vaut mieux).
Past participle formation The past participle is the form used after avoir or être to build compound tenses; it ends in -é for -er verbs, -i for regular -ir verbs, and follows irregular -u / -is / -it/-t patterns for Group 3 verbs.
Participe présent & gérondif The present participle and the gérondif both use the -ant form built from the nous-stem; the bare participle is an invariable verbal form that reduces a relative or adverbial clause, while the gérondif (en + -ant) is adverbial and must share the subject of the main verb.
Passé antérieur The passé antérieur is a literary compound tense expressing the past-before-a-past-simple-event; it appears almost exclusively in formal written narration inside time clauses whose main clause is in the passé simple.
Passé composé The passé composé is the everyday past tense for completed actions, formed with the present of avoir or être plus a past participle.
Passé récent (venir de + infinitive) The passé récent, venir de + infinitive, says that something has just happened; the present of venir means 'has just', and the imparfait of venir means 'had just', mirroring the futur proche on the other side of the timeline.
Passé simple The passé simple is the literary narrative past for single completed actions, built with three families of endings (-a/-èrent, -it/-irent, -ut/-urent) and replaced by the passé composé in speech.
The passive voice The French passive is être (in the tense of the active verb) plus a past participle that agrees with the subject; the agent, if named, is introduced by par (or de for states), and only transitive verbs can be made passive.
Plus-que-parfait The plus-que-parfait is the 'past before the past' (English 'had done'), formed with the imperfect of avoir or être plus the past participle, and it marks the earlier of two past events.
Present indicative The présent de l'indicatif states facts and current or habitual actions, and is formed by adding personal endings to the verb stem.
Pronominal (reflexive) verbs Pronominal verbs carry a reflexive pronoun (me, te, se, nous, vous, se) that matches the subject; they cover four senses — reflexive, reciprocal, idiomatic and passive — and always form their compound tenses with être.
Subjonctif imparfait The imperfect subjunctive is the literary past of the subjunctive, built on the passé simple stem with -sse endings and a circumflex on the third-person singular; modern French uses the present subjunctive instead.
Subjonctif passé The past subjunctive marks a completed action under a subjunctive trigger, formed with the present subjunctive of avoir or être plus the past participle.
Subjonctif plus-que-parfait The subjonctif plus-que-parfait is a literary compound subjunctive formed with the subjonctif imparfait of avoir or être plus the past participle; it expresses a past subjunctive after a past main verb and, in literature, can also stand for the second-form past conditional.
Subjonctif présent The present subjunctive is a mood used in a que-clause after expressions of will, emotion, doubt or necessity, formed for most verbs from the ils-stem plus the endings -e, -es, -e, -ions, -iez, -ent.
Verb + (à / de) + infinitive When one verb governs another, French uses three fixed patterns — a direct infinitive (vouloir partir), verb + à + infinitive (commencer à faire) and verb + de + infinitive (décider de faire) — and which one applies is a lexical property of the first verb.

Grammar

Adjective agreement French adjectives change form to agree in gender and number with the noun they describe, usually adding -e for the feminine and -s for the plural.
Adjective position (BAGS / pre- vs post-nominal) Most French adjectives follow the noun, but a small group describing Beauty, Age, Goodness and Size (BAGS) comes before it, and a few change meaning with position.
Adverbs: formation and position Most French adverbs of manner are built by adding -ment to the feminine form of the adjective; a few are irregular, and their placement depends on the tense and the type of adverb.
Article contractions (au / aux / du / des) The prepositions à and de combine with the definite articles le and les to form the mandatory contractions au, aux, du, and des.
Definite articles (le / la / les) The definite article (le, la, l', les) corresponds to English "the" and agrees in gender and number with its noun; French also uses it for nouns taken in a general sense.
Indefinite articles (un / une / des) The indefinite article (un, une, des) means "a/an" or "some" and marks a non-specific noun, agreeing in gender and number.
Partitive articles (du / de la / des) The partitive article (du, de la, de l', des) expresses an unspecified quantity, like English "some" or "any"; after a negation and after quantity words it reduces to plain de.
c'est vs il est Use c'est before a noun (usually with a determiner), a name or a stressed pronoun, and il/elle est before a bare adjective or an unmodified profession.
Comparatives (plus / moins / aussi … que) Comparatives express more, less or equal degrees using plus, moins or aussi before an adjective or adverb, with que to introduce what is compared.
Demonstrative adjectives (ce / cet / cette / ces) Demonstrative adjectives (ce, cet, cette, ces) mean "this/that" or "these/those" and agree in gender and number with the noun.
Noun gender (masculine / feminine) Every French noun is either masculine or feminine; its gender is fixed and controls the form of articles and adjectives, so it must be learned with the noun.
Indefinite adjectives and pronouns (tout, chaque, plusieurs) Indefinites express totality, quantity, distribution and identity; many come in an adjective form (before a noun) and a matching pronoun form, and several pair with ne for negation.
Interrogatives (quel, qu'est-ce qui/que, lequel) French questions use the interrogative adjective quel (which agrees with its noun), the interrogative pronoun lequel (and contractions auquel/duquel), the long forms qu'est-ce qui / qu'est-ce que / qui est-ce qui, and the short words qui, que and quoi.
Invariable adjectives (compound colors, demi, nu) A closed set of French adjectives — compound and noun-derived colors, demi, nu, ci-joint/ci-inclus — break the normal agreement rule and stay invariable in specific, learnable conditions.
même: same, even, -self Même has three distinct jobs — agreeing adjective meaning 'same', invariable adverb meaning 'even', and hyphenated intensifier meaning '-self' — and telling them apart is mostly about position and meaning.
The expletive ne (je crains qu'il ne vienne) In formal French, ne alone (without pas) can appear after certain verbs and conjunctions without expressing negation at all; it disappears in speech and must not be confused with real negation.
Negation: ne … pas Standard negation wraps the conjugated verb in two parts, ne … pas — ne before it and pas after it — and turns indefinite/partitive articles on the object into de.
Negation beyond pas: jamais / rien / personne / plus / aucun / que Keep ne before the verb and replace pas with jamais (never), rien (nothing), personne (nobody), plus (no longer) or aucun (no/none); ne … que means 'only' and is restrictive, not a true negation.
Forming plurals Most French nouns form their plural by adding a silent -s, though several endings follow special patterns such as -eau → -eaux and -al → -aux.
Past-participle agreement with avoir (preceding direct object) With avoir, the past participle agrees with the direct object only when that object comes before the verb; otherwise it stays invariable.
Past-participle agreement with être (subject) When a compound tense is formed with être, the past participle agrees in gender and number with the subject — add -e, -s or -es as needed.
Past-participle agreement with pronominal verbs Pronominal verbs take être, but their participle really follows the preceding-direct-object rule, agreeing with the reflexive pronoun only when that pronoun is the direct object.
Past participle + infinitive (fait, laissé, vu, entendu) When a past participle is directly followed by an infinitive, the ordinary agreement rules bend: fait never agrees, laissé is now treated as invariable too, and verbs of perception agree only if the preceding object performs the infinitive's action.
Possessive adjectives (mon / ma / mes) Possessive adjectives (mon, ma, mes, etc.) show ownership and agree with the thing possessed, not with the owner.
Prepositions à and de À marks destination, location and the indirect object ('to/at'); de marks origin, possession and material ('from/of'). Both fix verb constructions and both contract with le/les into au/aux and du/des.
Common prepositions (avec, sans, chez, pour, par) Beyond à and de, French relies on a set of high-frequency prepositions—avec, sans, chez, pour, par, dans/en, sur/sous and others—whose meanings often do not map one-to-one onto English or other languages.
Prepositions with places (à / en / au / aux + countries) Use à with cities, en with feminine countries and continents, au with masculine countries, aux with plural countries; the same prepositions mean both 'in' and 'to', and de/du marks origin.
Demonstrative pronouns (celui, celle, ce, ça) Use celui / celle / ceux / celles to replace a previously mentioned noun; they are never used alone but completed by -ci/-là, by de, or by a relative clause. The neutral ce/c', ceci, cela and ça point to ideas or unnamed things.
Direct-object pronouns (me / te / le / la / nous / vous / les) Direct-object pronouns (me, te, le, la, nous, vous, les) replace the noun directly receiving the action and stand before the conjugated verb, where they can trigger past-participle agreement.
The pronoun en The pronoun en replaces "de + something" and stands in for quantities, meaning "some", "of it/them", or "about it"; it always goes before the verb.
Indirect-object pronouns (lui / leur) Indirect-object pronouns replace "à + a person": lui means "to him/her", leur means "to them", and both stand before the verb.
Object-pronoun order When several object pronouns stack before the verb they follow a fixed order: me/te/se/nous/vous, then le/la/les, then lui/leur, then y, then en.
Possessive pronouns (le mien, le tien) Possessive pronouns such as le mien / la mienne / les miens replace a noun and mean "mine, yours, his/hers, ours, theirs". They always carry the definite article and agree in gender and number with the thing possessed, not with the owner.
Relative pronouns (qui / que / dont / où) Relative pronouns join two clauses: qui is the subject, que the direct object, dont replaces "de + noun", and où marks place or time.
Indefinite relatives (ce qui, ce que, ce dont) ce qui, ce que and ce dont introduce a relative clause whose antecedent is not a specific noun but a whole idea, clause, or unnamed thing ("what / that which"). The choice depends on the grammatical role inside the clause: subject, object, or complement with de.
Relative pronoun lequel Lequel (laquelle, lesquels, lesquelles) is the relative pronoun used after a preposition, agreeing in gender and number with its antecedent and contracting with à and de.
Stressed / disjunctive pronouns (moi / toi / lui) Stressed (disjunctive) pronouns — moi, toi, lui, elle, nous, vous, eux, elles — appear after prepositions, for emphasis, in c'est sentences and when a pronoun stands alone.
Subject pronouns French subject pronouns (je, tu, il, elle, on, nous, vous, ils, elles) name who performs the verb and decide its conjugation; unlike English, they can almost never be dropped.
The pronoun y The pronoun y replaces a place expression or a phrase introduced by à referring to a thing; it sits before the verb and is never used for a person.
Question formation: intonation / est-ce que / inversion Yes/no questions have three forms — rising intonation (casual), est-ce que at the front (neutral) and verb-subject inversion (formal); inversion inserts a euphonic -t- as in a-t-il.
Subjunctive triggers The subjunctive appears in a que-clause after expressions of will, necessity, emotion or doubt, and after certain conjunctions; it normally requires two different subjects, and certainty in the affirmative keeps the indicative.
Superlatives (le/la/les plus / moins …) Superlatives express the highest or lowest degree using the definite article plus plus or moins, as in le plus grand (the biggest).
tout / toute / tous / toutes Tout has three jobs — determiner, pronoun, and adverb — and each one agrees differently, with a special euphonic agreement for the adverb before feminine adjectives.

Usage

Logical connectors (cause, consequence, goal, opposition) Logical connectors link ideas by relation: cause (parce que, car, puisque, comme, à cause de / grâce à), consequence (donc, alors, c'est pourquoi, si bien que), goal (pour/afin de + infinitive, pour que/afin que + subjunctive), opposition/concession (mais, cependant, pourtant, bien que/quoique + subjunctive, malgré + noun) and addition (et, de plus, en outre).
Dates and telling time French dates are le + cardinal number + month (le 3 mai), with le premier only for the 1st and no capital letters on days or months; clock time uses heure(s) (il est huit heures), with midi/minuit for 12, et quart, et demie and moins le quart for the quarters, and the 24-hour clock in schedules.
Emphasis with c'est … qui / que To highlight a word, French brackets it in a cleft: c'est … qui emphasises the SUBJECT (« C'est Marie qui a payé »), c'est … que emphasises an object or complement (« C'est ce livre que je veux »; « C'est demain qu'on part »). The frame ce qui/ce que …, c'est highlights a whole idea. Choose qui for the subject slot and que for the object slot; verbs in the qui-clause agree with the highlighted noun.
Exclamations: quel…!, comme…!, que…! French builds exclamations with a small set of dedicated words — the agreeing adjective quel, and the invariable comme, que, and que de — each with its own structure, distinct from the interrogative comment.
Experiencer verbs (manquer, plaire) A few French verbs flip subject and object compared with English. With manquer ('to miss') and plaire ('to please/like'), the person or thing experienced is the SUBJECT and the experiencer is an indirect object (à / me te lui nous vous leur): « Tu me manques » = I miss you; « Ce livre me plaît » = I like this book. The same pattern drives il me reste and il me faut. The big trap: « je te manque » actually means 'you miss me'.
Restrictive ne … que (only) ne … que means 'only'. It is a restriction, not a negation, so it takes no pas: « Je n'ai que dix euros » = I only have ten euros. que sits immediately before the element it restricts (« Il ne mange que des légumes »), and ne faire que + infinitive means 'to do nothing but'. It is equivalent to seulement. Do not read que as a negation, and note that ne … pas que means 'not only'.
Numbers (incl. 70/80/90) Standard French builds 70-99 by arithmetic — 70 = soixante-dix (60+10), 80 = quatre-vingts (4x20), 90 = quatre-vingt-dix (4x20+10); et appears only in 21/31/41/51/61/71, vingt keeps its -s in quatre-vingts alone, and Belgium/Switzerland use the simpler septante and nonante (plus huitante in parts of Switzerland).
tu vs vous (politeness) French has two words for "you": tu is the informal singular for people you are close to, while vous is both the polite singular for distance or respect and the only plural for any group.
Expressions of quantity (beaucoup de, un peu de…) Adverbs of quantity — beaucoup, (un) peu, assez, trop, plus, moins, autant, tant, combien — are linked to a noun by the plain, invariable de (d' before a vowel), with no article: « beaucoup de livres », not « beaucoup des livres ». Use un peu de for uncountables and quelques for countables. A few set phrases keep the article: bien des, la plupart des, encore du.
Register: soutenu, courant, familier French speech and writing shift across three registers — soutenu (formal), courant (neutral standard), and familier (casual) — and the choice changes not just vocabulary but grammar: negation, question formation, and pronouns.
Reported (indirect) speech Indirect speech reports words through a subordinate clause: statements use que, yes/no questions use si, and wh-questions keep their question word (with ce qui/ce que for qu'est-ce qui/qu'est-ce que). After a past reporting verb, tenses backshift and time markers and pronouns shift.
Sequence of tenses (concordance des temps) When the main verb is in a past tense, the verb in a que-clause "backshifts": présent becomes imparfait, passé composé becomes plus-que-parfait, and futur becomes conditionnel — expressing simultaneity, anteriority and posteriority relative to the past.
Si clauses (conditional sentences) French conditional sentences pair a si-clause with a result clause in three fixed patterns: si + present → present/future/imperative; si + imparfait → conditionnel présent; si + plus-que-parfait → conditionnel passé. The conditional and the future never appear directly after si.
Futur simple vs futur proche (aller + infinitive) The futur proche (aller + infinitive) frames the future as near, planned or connected to now and dominates speech; the one-word futur simple is for distant, formal or written future, predictions and promises, and is required after quand/dès que/lorsque when the main clause is future.
Passé composé vs imparfait Use the passé composé for completed, time-bounded past events that move a story forward, and the imparfait for background description, ongoing situations and repeated habits with no clear endpoint.
Time: il y a, ça fait, depuis il y a + duration means 'ago' — a finished point in the past: « il y a deux ans » (two years ago). il y a … que and ça fait … que + the PRESENT express a duration still going on now, exactly like depuis: « Ça fait deux ans que j'habite ici » = « J'habite ici depuis deux ans » (I have lived here for two years). French uses the present for the ongoing case where English uses the present perfect.
depuis / pendant / pour Use depuis for an action that began in the past and still continues (with the present tense), pendant for the full, completed duration of an action, and pour for a planned or intended length of time.

Contrasts

a vs à a (no accent) is the verb avoir in the third person (il a = he has); à (grave accent) is a preposition meaning to, at or in; since they are homophones, test by replacing the word with avait — if it still works it is the verb a, otherwise it is the preposition à.
amener vs apporter Use amener (root -mener, "to lead") for people and animals you bring along, and apporter (root -porter, "to carry") for objects you bring; the same split governs the "away" pair emmener (lead a person away) vs emporter (carry a thing away). Decision rule: if it can walk, lead it (amener/emmener); if you must carry it, carry it (apporter/emporter).
an vs année (jour/journée, matin/matinée) The masculine forms an, jour, matin, soir name a unit of time as a point or a count, while the feminine forms année, journée, matinée, soirée stress the duration or the content of that span.
bon vs bien bon is an adjective ("good") that describes a noun and agrees with it in gender and number, while bien is mainly an adverb ("well") that modifies a verb, adjective or adverb and never changes form.
c'est vs s'est (and ces / ses) c'est (ce + est) presents or identifies something ("it is/this is": c'est vrai; test: replace with cela est); s'est (se + est) is the reflexive pronoun before être in a pronominal passé composé and is always followed by a past participle (il s'est levé). The related pair ces (plural demonstrative, "these": ces livres; singular: ce/cette) and ses (plural possessive, "his/her": ses livres; singular: son/sa) are also /sɛ/ or /se/ and follow the same singular-swap logic.
ce vs se ce is a demonstrative ("this/that") used before a noun (ce livre) or before être (c'est, ce sont); se is the third-person reflexive pronoun used right before a verb (il se lave). Decision rule: if the word stands before a conjugated verb other than être and the action reflects on the subject, write se; before a noun or before être, write ce.
sûr/sur, dû/du, mûr/mur (the distinguishing circumflex) Several French homophone pairs are distinguished only by a circumflex accent: sûr ("sure/certain", adjective, agrees: sûre/sûrs) vs sur ("on", invariable preposition); dû (past participle of devoir, circumflex only in the masculine singular: due/dus/dues drop it) vs du (partitive/contracted article); mûr ("ripe/mature", agrees: mûre) vs mur ("wall", noun). The same pattern appears in jeûne ("fast", noun/verb) vs jeune ("young") and crû (past participle of croître) vs cru (past participle of croire, or "raw"). Rule of thumb: the circumflex marks the meaningful word (adjective/participle); the bare form is the grammatical word (preposition/article/noun).
dans vs d'en dans is a preposition meaning "in/inside/within" (dans la boîte; dans deux jours = "in two days' time"); d'en is de + the pronoun en elided (il vient d'en parler = "he just talked about it"; je suis content d'en avoir = "I'm glad to have some"). Test: dans is always followed by a noun phrase; d'en is always followed by a verb (usually an infinitive) or an adverb. Also covers d'en face / d'en haut ("from the one opposite/above").
entendre vs écouter entendre means "to hear" — the passive perception of sound that reaches your ears — while écouter means "to listen to" — the deliberate act of paying attention. Both are directly transitive: you écouter someone, never *écouter à.
et vs est vs es et is the invariable conjunction "and" (le pain et le vin); est is the third-person singular of être, "is" (il est grand); es is the second-person singular of être, "are" (tu es prêt). In careless speech all three can sound alike, but in careful pronunciation et is /e/ while est/es are /ɛ/. Test: replace the word with était — if it still works, it is a form of être (est/es); replace it with et puis — if that works, it is the conjunction et.
être vs avoir être means "to be" and avoir means "to have", but French uses avoir for many states English expresses with "to be" (age, hunger, fear), and the two split the work of forming compound tenses.
Faux amis (false friends with English) Faux amis look like English words but mean something different, or even the opposite — actuellement means "currently", not "actually"; librairie means "bookshop", not "library".
jour vs journée (and matin/matinée, soir/soirée, an/année) French has two words for each unit of time: the short masculine form (jour, matin, soir, an) names the unit as a countable point, while the feminine -ée form (journée, matinée, soirée, année) names the whole span as it is filled and experienced.
la vs là vs l'a Three words pronounced /la/ are constantly confused in writing: la (the article or object pronoun), là (the adverb "there", written with a grave accent), and l'a (the elided pronoun l'/la plus the verb form a, "has"). A quick test tells them apart.
leur vs leurs leur has two grammatical lives: as an indirect-object pronoun before a verb it means "(to) them" and is invariable (never *leurs), while as a possessive adjective before a noun it means "their" and takes -s when the noun is plural (leur maison, leurs enfants).
mais vs mes vs met(s) mais = "but" (conjunction); mes = plural possessive "my" (mes amis, singular mon/ma); met/mets = the verb mettre in the present (il met, tu mets); un mets = "a dish" (rare noun). All are pronounced /mɛ/. Tests: mais can be replaced by pourtant ("however"); mes can be replaced by tes or ses; met(s) can be replaced by mettait (imparfait of mettre).
meilleur vs mieux Both translate English "better", but meilleur is the irregular comparative of the adjective bon (and agrees with its noun), while mieux is the irregular comparative of the adverb bien (and never changes). *plus bon and *plus bien do not exist.
on vs ont on is the indefinite subject pronoun ("one/we/people": on mange à midi); ont is the verb avoir conjugated for ils/elles (ils ont faim). Both are pronounced /ɔ̃/. Decision rule: if you can replace the word with avaient (imparfait of avoir), it's ont; if you can replace it with a subject like il, it's on. Because on is a subject, "on ont" is impossible — on always takes a third-person-singular verb (on a, on est).
ou vs où ou (no accent) is the conjunction "or" offering a choice (thé ou café); où (grave accent) means "where" — a place — and, after a time word, "when" (où vas-tu ?, le jour où). Decision rule: if you can replace it with "or" (ou bien), write ou; if it really means where/when, write où.
partir vs sortir vs quitter partir = to leave/set off (intransitive, aux être: je suis parti); sortir = to go out of an enclosed space or go out socially (être when intransitive, avoir when transitive); quitter = to leave someone or something and always needs a direct object (aux avoir: j'ai quitté). Decision rule: name what you leave → quitter; just set off → partir; exit a place → sortir.
peu vs peux vs peut peu is an adverb meaning "little/few" (un peu de, très peu); peux is pouvoir in the first- or second-person singular present (je peux, tu peux); peut is pouvoir in the third-person singular present (il/elle/on peut). All three are pronounced /pø/. Test: if you can replace the word with pouvait (imparfait), it's a verb form (peux/peut, chosen by subject); if you can replace it with its opposite, beaucoup, it's peu. Also distinguish peut-être ("maybe," one fixed word) from il peut être ("he can be").
plus tôt vs plutôt plus tôt (two words) is the comparative of tôt ("early"), meaning "earlier" — the opposite of plus tard ("later"). plutôt (one word) means "rather," "instead," or "quite," expressing preference or degree. Test: if you can substitute plus tard and the sentence still talks about timing, it is plus tôt (two words); otherwise it is plutôt.
près vs prêt près and prêt sound the same (/pʁɛ/) but are unrelated: près is an adverb/preposition meaning "near" (près de + noun), while prêt is an adjective meaning "ready" that agrees (prêt/prête/prêts/prêtes) and takes prêt à + infinitive. A homophone un prêt also exists, meaning "a loan".
quand vs quant vs qu'en quand = "when" (conjunction or question word: quand pars-tu ?); quant appears only in the fixed expression quant à/aux, "as for" (quant à moi, je reste); qu'en is que + en (Qu'en penses-tu ? = "what do you think of it?"). All are pronounced /kɑ̃/. Tests: followed by à/aux → quant; expandable to "que … de cela" → qu'en; otherwise → quand.
quel(le)(s) vs qu'elle(s) quel/quelle/quels/quelles is an interrogative-exclamative determiner that agrees with the noun it introduces (Quelle heure est-il ? Quel beau jour !); qu'elle(s) is the conjunction/pronoun que elided before elle(s) (je crois qu'elle vient). Both are pronounced /kɛl/. Test: replace the word with qu'il — if the sentence still works grammatically, it's qu'elle; if the word sits directly before a noun and changes form to agree with it, it's quel(le)(s).
quelque vs quel que (and quoique vs quoi que) quelque(s) is a one-word determiner meaning "some, a few"; quel(le)(s) que is two words meaning "whatever ... may be" and takes être in the subjunctive, with quel agreeing with the subject. The parallel pair quoique/quoi que works the same way.
sa vs ça (vs çà) sa is the feminine singular possessive adjective "his/her" (sa maison, always before a feminine noun); ça is the informal pronoun "that/it," short for cela (ça va, ça m'énerve); çà is a rare archaic adverb that survives only in the fixed phrase çà et là ("here and there"). All three are pronounced /sa/. Tests: sa can be replaced by ma/ta; ça can be replaced by cela.
savoir vs connaître Both translate as "to know," but savoir is for facts, information and knowing how to do something (and takes a clause or an infinitive), while connaître is for being familiar with a person, place or thing (and takes a direct noun).
son vs sont son is a possessive adjective meaning "his/her/its" before a masculine singular noun (son frère) or before a feminine noun starting with a vowel (son école); sont is the verb être conjugated for ils/elles (ils sont là). Both are pronounced /sɔ̃/. Test: if you can replace the word with étaient (imparfait of être), it's sont; if you can replace it with mon or ton, it's son. (A third, unrelated word, un son, means "a sound.")
voir vs regarder voir means "to see" — the passive perception that happens to your eyes — while regarder means "to look at / to watch" — the deliberate act of directing your attention. Both are directly transitive: you regarder something, never *regarder à.

Pronunciation

Accents (é è ê ç) French diacritics change how a letter sounds or distinguish words in writing; they are part of correct spelling, not optional decoration.
Consonants (the French r and others) French consonants differ from English in four big ways: the r is uvular /ʁ/ (from the back of the throat, not the English retroflex r); /p t k/ are unaspirated (no puff of air); /t d/ are dental; and gn spells /ɲ/. Final consonants are usually silent, except often the 'CaReFuL' set c, r, f, l. The letter h is never pronounced.
Élision (le → l', je → j') Elision drops the final vowel of a few short words before a word starting with a vowel sound or mute h, and the gap is written with an apostrophe.
Enchaînement & rhythm Enchaînement re-syllabifies an already-pronounced final consonant onto the following word's vowel, unlike liaison, which revives a normally silent one; together with syllable-timed rhythm, it gives French its seamless, gapless flow.
Spelling to sound (ch, gn, -ill-, qu…) French spelling is far more regular than English once you know the main grapheme-to-phoneme rules: ch = /ʃ/, gn = /ɲ/, qu = /k/, ç = /s/, ph = /f/, th = /t/. The letters c and g are 'soft' (/s/, /ʒ/) before e/i/y and 'hard' (/k/, /g/) elsewhere. Vowel digraphs are systematic too: au/eau = /o/, ai/ei = /ɛ/, oi = /wa/, ou = /u/, eu = /ø~œ/.
h aspiré vs h muet The letter h is never pronounced in French, but an "aspirate" h blocks elision and liaison while a "mute" h allows them.
Liaison Liaison pronounces a normally silent final consonant and links it to a following word that begins with a vowel sound.
Nasal vowels Nasal vowels are pronounced with air flowing through the nose; they are written as a vowel plus m or n that is not itself sounded.
Numbers aloud: cinq, six, huit, dix, neuf, vingt Several French numbers change their final consonant depending on what follows: pronounced in full when counting alone, often reduced before a consonant, and linked by liaison before a vowel.
Oral vowels & the e caduc French has a rich set of oral vowels /i e ɛ a (ɑ) ɔ o u y ø œ ə/. Key contrasts for learners are closed /e/ vs open /ɛ/, the rounded front /y/ vs back /u/, and /ø/ vs /œ/. The e caduc (schwa /ə/) is often dropped in speech.
Semi-vowels (/w/, /ɥ/, /j/) French has three semi-vowels (glides): /j/ (the yod, as in hier /jɛʁ/ and fille /fij/), /w/ (as in oui /wi/ and moi /mwa/), and the rounded /ɥ/ (as in lui /lɥi/ and huit /ɥit/). They arise when i, u or ou come before another vowel. The hard one for anglophones is /ɥ/, and the pair /wi/ (oui) vs /ɥi/ (huit) is a key contrast.
Silent letters French writes many letters that are not pronounced, especially final consonants and the letter e; they often resurface in liaison or mark grammar.

Regional (Québec)

Québec anglicisms and calques Contact with English gives Québec French a layer of casual borrowings and loan translations such as c'est le fun, canceller and tomber en amour, yet the same variety often keeps or coins French where Europe borrows English, as with courriel, clavardage, stationnement and arrêt; the result is strongly register-dependent and shaped by deliberate language planning.
Québec grammatical features (a survey) Québec French follows the same standard grammar as European French in writing, but informal speech shows a cluster of distinctive morphosyntactic features, including the reinforced pronouns nous autres / vous autres / eux autres, on for nous, the yes/no question particle -tu, sentence-final là, and several verb and preposition patterns such as barrer / débarrer.
Québec / Canadian French — overview Québec French is a full regional standard of the French language with its own pronunciation, vocabulary, and informal grammar, mutually intelligible with European French and ranging from formal usage to the vernacular known as joual.
Québec pronunciation: affrication of /t/ and /d/ (tu → /tsy/, dire → /dzir/) In Québec French the stops /t/ and /d/ are released as the affricates [ts] and [dz] before the high front vowels /i/ and /y/ and their glides, so tu is [tsy] and dire is [dzir].
Québec pronunciation: vowel oppositions, laxing, and diphthongization Québec French keeps vowel oppositions that have largely merged in France (patte vs pâte, brin vs brun), laxes the high vowels /i y u/ in closed syllables, and diphthongizes long vowels in informal speech.
Québec interrogative particle -tu In informal Québec (and broader Canadian and Laurentian) French, a yes/no question can be marked by attaching the particle -tu to the verb, as in Tu viens-tu? or C'est-tu loin?; this -tu is a question marker derived from the old inversion ending, not the pronoun tu, and works with any subject.
Québec everyday vocabulary (char, magasiner, dépanneur) Québec French shares its core lexicon with European French but differs in hundreds of everyday words, some preserved from older usage, some local coinages, and some with shifted meanings, the best known being char (car), magasiner (to shop), dépanneur (corner store) and the meal names déjeuner, dîner and souper.