Nous avons bien fait is a common French phrase used to say that a past action was the right one. It shows up after decisions, choices and actions of all kinds, from small everyday matters to major life choices. This article looks at what the phrase means and how it is used. Meaning Literally, nous…
À tout hasard means “just in case” or “on the off chance”. Word for word, à is “at”, tout is “any” and hasard is “chance”, so the phrase translates literally as “at any chance”. It describes an action taken as a precaution, without knowing whether it will actually be needed. The phrase does not introduce…
English speakers learning French often confuse à l’heure and à temps. Both relate to time, but they serve distinct purposes. This article explains their meanings, gives many examples, and lists synonyms. Core meanings À l’heure literally translates as “at the hour.” Figuratively, it means “on time” or “punctual.” It refers to a fixed point on…
Quoi d’autre is a short question used constantly in spoken French, usually to ask for more information after something has already been mentioned. It appears in shops, in offices, in casual chats and in written French too. This article looks at what the phrase means, why it is built the way it is, and how…
Attendre means “to wait” or “to wait for”. When it is followed by que and a second verb, that second verb must go into the subjunctive mood, because the event being waited for has not happened yet and is not certain from the speaker’s point of view. This is the same logic behind other French…
Pas grand-chose is one of the most common phrases in everyday French. It turns up in casual conversation, in answers to simple questions, and in complaints about weather, food, work and just about everything else. Despite its frequency, the phrase hides an odd bit of grammar: the word grand stays masculine even though it sits…
Qu’avez-vous comme vin rouge? is a everyday French question meaning “What red wine do you have?” It belongs to a wider pattern, qu’avez-vous comme…? or qu’est-ce que vous avez comme…?, both meaning “what do you have in the way of…?” or, more naturally, “what do you have for…?” or simply “what…do you have?” This pattern…
Chez comes from the Latin word for house, casa, so chez moi translates literally as something like “at the house of me”. In practice, it simply means “at my place”. The same word extends well beyond housing, though, and can point to a person’s country, their body, their character, their profession, their culture or even…
If your French sounds correct but somehow “translated,” pouvoir is often part of the problem. English speakers reach for “can” constantly — for ability, permission, possibility, requests, and hedging all at once. French spreads these jobs across several different tools, so leaning on pouvoir the way you lean on “can” makes your French grammatically fine…
A small group of French verbs ending in -oir can also stand alone as masculine nouns, usually preceded by le or l’. This happens because French allows an infinitive to be treated as a thing in its own right, much like English sometimes turns “to know” into “the knowing” in older or more formal writing….
