Does elle mean she or it in French?

Both. Elle means she when it refers to a person and it when it refers to a feminine noun. La table est neuve, elle est en chêne means the table is new, it's oak. The choice depends purely on the gender of the noun being replaced.

When do I use elles instead of ils?

Only when every member of the group is feminine. Mes cousines ? Elles viennent. Add one masculine member and it becomes ils, so mes cousines et mon frère ? Ils viennent. French has no gender-neutral plural pronoun.

How do I hear the difference between elle and elles?

You can't hear the pronoun itself: both are pronounced the same. The clue is the verb, and only for verbs whose plural ending is audible: elle dort and elles dorment differ, but elle parle and elles parlent are identical in sound.

Is it elle or lui after a preposition?

For a woman or a feminine noun it's elle: avec elle, pour elle, à côté d'elle. Lui is the masculine stressed form in that position, so avec lui means with him. Lui as an indirect object pronoun is different again and covers both genders.

Why is it il fait froid and not elle fait froid?

Weather, time and impersonal expressions use il as an empty placeholder subject, standing for nothing at all. Since there is no noun and therefore no gender, elle never appears there: il pleut, il est tard, il y a du monde.

French grammar · Beginner

Elle and Elles in French: She, It, and the Feminine They

Written by Camille Laurent, Lead French Curriculum Editor · Reviewed May 2026

Elle means she, and it also means it whenever the noun it stands for is grammatically feminine, so a table or a car is elle in French. The plural elles means they, but only for a group with no masculine member in it. Both forms double as stressed pronouns after prepositions: avec elle, sans elles.

Elle habite à Lyon, mais ses sœurs ? Elles sont restées à Nice.

She lives in Lyon, but her sisters? They stayed in Nice.

What it is

Elle is the third-person feminine pronoun, and French uses it far more widely than English uses she. Because every French noun has a gender, anything feminine takes elle: la voiture becomes elle, la porte becomes elle. The plural elles is narrower than English they, because a single masculine member in the group switches it to ils.

Ma valise ? Elle est déjà dans la voiture. — My suitcase? It's already in the car.

How to spot it

Look at the gender of the noun rather than at whether it's alive. If the noun takes la or une, its pronoun is elle, whatever the thing actually is.

Ma sœur ? Elle arrive. — My sister? She's on her way.
La réunion ? Elle commence à neuf heures. — The meeting? It starts at nine.
Mes cousines sont là : elles attendent dehors. — My cousins are here: they're waiting outside.
Les fenêtres sont ouvertes, elles laissent entrer l'air. — The windows are open, they're letting the air in.

Elle and elles are pronounced identically. In speech, the only clue to the plural is the verb: elle arrive and elles arrivent sound different only because of the verb ending, and with an -er verb even that difference disappears.

Elle and Elles Quick Reference

Where elle and elles turn up

Function	Singular	Plural	Example
Subject	elle	elles	Elle chante — she sings
Standing for a feminine noun	elle	elles	La lampe ? Elle est cassée — the lamp? It's broken
After a preposition	elle	elles	avec elle — with her
After a comparison	elle	elles	plus grand qu'elle — taller than her
Emphasis at the front	elle	elles	Elle, elle refuse — she refuses
With -même	elle-même	elles-mêmes	Elle l'a fait elle-même — she did it herself
Mixed group	—	ils	Anne et Marc ? Ils sortent — Anne and Marc? They're going out

Common Elle and Elles Examples in French

Elle and elles in the four situations you'll meet most:

Elle Meaning She

Elle travaille dans une banque.: She works in a bank.
Elle est partie sans rien dire.: She left without saying anything.
Est-ce qu'elle a compris ?: Did she understand?
Elle ne veut pas venir.: She doesn't want to come.

With être and the other verbs that take être in the past, the participle agrees: elle est partie, elle est allée, elle s'est levée.

Elle Meaning It

Cette chaise est vieille, mais elle est solide.: This chair is old, but it's sturdy.
La voiture ? Elle est au garage.: The car? It's at the garage.
Ma montre s'est arrêtée : elle est cassée.: My watch has stopped: it's broken.
La soupe est chaude, elle sort du four.: The soup is hot, it's just out of the oven.

This is the use with no English equivalent. There's nothing feminine about a chair; the pronoun simply copies the grammatical gender of chaise.

Elles for an All-Feminine Group

Mes filles ? Elles dorment encore.: My daughters? They're still asleep.
Elles se sont rencontrées à Paris.: They met in Paris.
Les clés sont là où elles étaient.: The keys are where they were.
Elles ont toutes accepté.: They all agreed.

Elles is used for feminine objects too, so a set of keys or two windows are elles just as much as two women are.

Elle as a Stressed Pronoun

Je pense souvent à elle.: I often think about her.
C'est elle qui a tout organisé.: She's the one who organised it all.
Elle et son frère sont jumeaux.: She and her brother are twins.
Sans elles, rien n'aurait marché.: Without them, nothing would have worked.

Unlike il, which becomes lui when stressed, elle keeps the same form in every position. That makes the feminine noticeably simpler.

How Elle and Elles Work

Four points cover the whole system, and two of them are the ones English speakers have to learn deliberately.

Gender Comes From the Noun, Not the Thing

French pronouns copy grammatical gender. La table, la question and la voiture are all feminine, so all three are elle. There is no separate neuter pronoun to fall back on.

J'aime cette maison : elle a beaucoup de charme.

I love this house: it has a lot of charm.

la → elle, le → il.

One Masculine Member Makes the Group Ils

Elles requires every member of the group to be feminine. Add a single masculine noun and the pronoun becomes ils, however many feminine members there are.

Trois filles et un garçon : ils sont quatre.

Three girls and one boy: there are four of them.

Any masculine at all → ils.

Elle Stays Elle When Stressed

The masculine pronoun has two shapes, il as a subject and lui when stressed. The feminine has only one, so elle is used after prepositions, in comparisons, and standing on its own.

Je sors avec elle, pas avec lui.

I'm going out with her, not with him.

il / lui, but elle / elle.

Participles and Adjectives Agree With It

Because elle is feminine, everything that describes it takes a feminine ending. In the plural, add an s as well. This is where a wrong pronoun shows up visibly in writing.

Elles sont arrivées fatiguées mais contentes.

They arrived tired but happy.

elle → -e, elles → -es.

Elle Is Not Used for Weather or Abstract It

The empty English it in it's raining or it's difficult has no gender to copy, so French uses il as a dummy subject. Elle never fills that role.

Il pleut et il est difficile de sortir.

It's raining and it's hard to go out.

Dummy it → il, always.

Common Mistakes with Elle and Elles

Incorrect: La voiture est nouvelle. Il est rouge. — The car is new. It's red.

Correct: La voiture est nouvelle. Elle est rouge. — The car is new. It's red.

Voiture is feminine, so its pronoun is elle even though English calls a car it. Falling back on il for objects is the most frequent error here.

Incorrect: Ma mère et mon père ? Elles arrivent demain. — My mother and father? They're arriving tomorrow.

Correct: Ma mère et mon père ? Ils arrivent demain. — My mother and father? They're arriving tomorrow.

A mixed group takes ils, no matter what the order of the nouns is. Elles is reserved for groups that are feminine without exception.

Incorrect: Je pars avec ils. — I'm leaving with them.

Correct: Je pars avec eux. — I'm leaving with them.

Ils only exists as a subject. After a preposition the masculine plural is eux, while the feminine plural keeps the form elles.

Incorrect: Elle est difficile de comprendre. — It's hard to understand.

Correct: Il est difficile de comprendre. — It's hard to understand.

Here it refers to nothing at all, so there is no gender to copy. French uses il as an impersonal subject in these expressions, never elle.

Three Things Elle Does That She Doesn't

Once you accept that elle is about grammar rather than about people, these follow naturally.

Standing in for feminine objects

Any feminine noun becomes elle when you stop naming it. English would switch to it, so this pattern has to be built deliberately.

Cette histoire ? Elle est vraie.: That story? It's true.
La porte grince : elle a besoin d'huile.: The door squeaks: it needs oil.
Prends cette route, elle est plus rapide.: Take this road, it's faster.
La lettre est arrivée hier, elle était courte.: The letter arrived yesterday, it was short.

The same applies to the object pronouns: la voiture becomes la in je la vends, I'm selling it.

After every preposition and comparison

Elle is also the stressed form, so it appears after prepositions, after que in comparisons and after c'est. No change of shape is needed.

Ce cadeau est pour elle.: This present is for her.
Il court plus vite qu'elle.: He runs faster than her.
Chez elles, on dîne vers vingt heures.: At their place, dinner is around eight.
C'est à elle de décider.: It's up to her to decide.

Note the elision in qu'elle: que always contracts before it, which is why comparisons are written qu'elle and not que elle.

Elle-même and reinforcing elle

Add -même for herself or themselves in the emphatic sense, and repeat the pronoun at the front of the clause for contrast.

Elle l'a réparé elle-même.: She fixed it herself.
Elles s'organisent elles-mêmes.: They organise themselves.
Elle, elle n'est jamais en retard.: She's never late.
Lui, il hésite ; elle, elle décide.: He hesitates; she decides.

Doubling the pronoun like this is extremely common in speech and is the usual way French marks contrast, since it can't rely on stressing a word the way English does.

Elle and Elles FAQs

Does elle mean she or it in French?: Both. Elle means she when it refers to a person and it when it refers to a feminine noun. La table est neuve, elle est en chêne means the table is new, it's oak. The choice depends purely on the gender of the noun being replaced.
When do I use elles instead of ils?: Only when every member of the group is feminine. Mes cousines ? Elles viennent. Add one masculine member and it becomes ils, so mes cousines et mon frère ? Ils viennent. French has no gender-neutral plural pronoun.
How do I hear the difference between elle and elles?: You can't hear the pronoun itself: both are pronounced the same. The clue is the verb, and only for verbs whose plural ending is audible: elle dort and elles dorment differ, but elle parle and elles parlent are identical in sound.
Is it elle or lui after a preposition?: For a woman or a feminine noun it's elle: avec elle, pour elle, à côté d'elle. Lui is the masculine stressed form in that position, so avec lui means with him. Lui as an indirect object pronoun is different again and covers both genders.
Why is it il fait froid and not elle fait froid?: Weather, time and impersonal expressions use il as an empty placeholder subject, standing for nothing at all. Since there is no noun and therefore no gender, elle never appears there: il pleut, il est tard, il y a du monde.