French grammar · Beginner
Feminine Nouns in French: Articles, Agreement, and Feminine Forms
A feminine noun in French is one that takes la, une, cette and ma, and that pulls every adjective and past participle around it into the feminine as well. For objects the gender is simply a property of the word; for people it is usually built from the masculine form, as in un boulanger becoming une boulangère.
La nouvelle directrice est arrivée ce matin.
The new director arrived this morning.
What it is
Gender in French is a label attached to the word, not a claim about the thing it names. La table is feminine and le bureau is masculine for reasons buried in Latin, and neither says anything about tables or desks. What the label does is decide the shape of everything the noun touches: its article, its adjectives, its past participles and the pronoun that later replaces it.
Cette vieille maison a été vendue. — That old house has been sold.
How to spot it
The article is the first signal, and often the only one. Anything that agrees with the noun afterwards confirms it, which matters when the article itself is hiding the gender.
- une longue journée — a long day
- ma première voiture — my first car
- cette réponse est fausse — that answer is wrong
- l'histoire est finie — the story is over
Before a vowel, la becomes l' and the article stops telling you anything. L'eau, l'école and l'idée are feminine; l'homme and l'hôtel are not.
Feminine Nouns Quick Reference
Building the feminine form of a noun that names a person
| Masculine | Feminine | What changes |
|---|---|---|
| un étudiant | une étudiante | add -e; the final consonant becomes audible |
| un boulanger | une boulangère | -er becomes -ère |
| un chanteur | une chanteuse | -eur becomes -euse |
| un acteur | une actrice | -teur usually becomes -trice |
| un pharmacien | une pharmacienne | -ien becomes -ienne, the consonant doubles |
| un veuf | une veuve | -f becomes -ve |
| un élève | une élève | nothing; only the article changes |
| un roi | une reine | a different word altogether |
Common Feminine Nouns Examples in French
Feminine nouns in the four situations you meet them:
Feminine Because the Word Is
- la table
- the table
- une chaise
- a chair
- la voiture
- the car
- une fenêtre
- a window
- la porte
- the door
There is nothing to work out here. The gender is part of the vocabulary item, which is why it pays to learn une fenêtre rather than fenêtre.
Built from the Masculine
- un voisin, une voisine
- a neighbour (m), a neighbour (f)
- un serveur, une serveuse
- a waiter, a waitress
- un directeur, une directrice
- a director (m), a director (f)
- un Italien, une Italienne
- an Italian man, an Italian woman
- un époux, une épouse
- a husband, a wife
Written French adds a letter; spoken French usually adds a whole sound, because the feminine -e wakes up the consonant before it.
Same Word, Two Articles
- un artiste, une artiste
- an artist (m), an artist (f)
- un journaliste, une journaliste
- a journalist (m), a journalist (f)
- un secrétaire, une secrétaire
- a secretary (m), a secretary (f)
- un collègue, une collègue
- a colleague (m), a colleague (f)
A noun that already ends in an unstressed -e has nowhere to add another one, so the article carries the whole distinction.
Feminine Nouns That Name Anyone
- une personne
- a person (of any sex)
- la victime
- the victim
- une vedette
- a star, a celebrity
- une recrue
- a recruit
These stay feminine whoever they refer to: la victime a été transportée à l'hôpital, even if the victim is a man.
How Feminine Nouns Behave
Gender is only worth learning because of what it controls. These are the five places it shows up.
The Article Carries the Gender
La, une, de la, cette, ma, ta and sa all mark a feminine noun. In the plural they collapse into les, des, ces and mes, which is why the plural tells you nothing about gender at all.
la chaise, une chaise, cette chaise, ma chaise
the chair, a chair, this chair, my chair
Singular shows gender, plural hides it.
Agreement Spreads Outwards
Every adjective attached to a feminine noun takes the feminine form, and so does a past participle after être. The noun is the source; everything downstream copies it, sometimes several words later.
Ces petites villes sont devenues très touristiques.
These small towns have become very touristy.
One feminine noun, a whole feminine sentence.
The Feminine -e Is Usually Audible
French normally drops a final consonant, but adding -e brings it back. Étudiant ends in a nasal vowel, étudiante ends in a clear t. That is why the feminine of a person noun sounds different, while the feminine of an adjective like joli does not.
un client, une cliente
a customer (m), a customer (f)
The -e makes the consonant speak.
Some Feminines Rebuild the Whole Word
A small group of person nouns does not modify the masculine at all; it replaces it. These are the oldest words in the family vocabulary, and they have to be learnt as pairs.
un homme et une femme, un neveu et une nièce
a man and a woman, a nephew and a niece
Old words, separate forms.
Grammar Beats Biology
When the gender of the noun and the sex of the person disagree, the grammar follows the noun. Une sentinelle and une victime stay feminine for a man; un témoin and un mannequin stay masculine for a woman.
Cette femme est un témoin fiable.
That woman is a reliable witness.
Agree with the word, not the person.
Common Mistakes with Feminine Nouns
Incorrect: une chanteur — a singer (f)
Correct: une chanteuse — a singer (f)
Changing the article is not enough when the noun has a feminine form of its own. -eur becomes -euse, so the whole word changes, not just the word in front of it.
Incorrect: J'ai fini la livre. — I finished the book.
Correct: J'ai fini le livre. — I finished the book.
Livre exists in both genders with unrelated meanings. La livre is a pound in weight or money; the book is le livre.
Incorrect: La victime était inconscient. — The victim was unconscious.
Correct: La victime était inconsciente. — The victim was unconscious.
Agreement follows the grammatical gender of the noun, not the sex of the person. Victime is feminine, so the adjective is feminine even when the victim is a man.
Incorrect: la eau froide — the cold water
Correct: l'eau froide — the cold water
La contracts to l' before a vowel or a mute h. The gender does not disappear with it — froide is still feminine, and so is une eau minérale.
Feminine Forms Worth Knowing Separately
Three areas where the ordinary rules leave you without an answer: job titles, animals, and nouns with a single fixed gender.
Feminised job titles
Several professions had no feminine form until recently. Modern French, and the Académie française since 2019, accepts feminine versions built the ordinary way.
- une professeure
- a teacher (f)
- une autrice
- an author (f)
- une écrivaine
- a writer (f)
- une ingénieure
- an engineer (f)
- madame la maire
- the mayor (f)
Usage is still settling: une auteure and une autrice are both current, and Quebec adopted these forms decades before France did.
Animals with two names
Farm and domestic animals often have a full pair of nouns, one for each sex, alongside a general word for the species.
- un chat, une chatte
- a cat (m), a cat (f)
- un chien, une chienne
- a dog, a bitch
- un coq, une poule
- a cockerel, a hen
- un cheval, une jument
- a horse, a mare
- un taureau, une vache
- a bull, a cow
Wild animals usually have one gender for the species: une girafe and une souris are feminine whatever the animal is.
Nouns with one gender for everybody
Some nouns never change gender no matter who they describe. Everything agreeing with them follows the noun.
- une personne charmante
- a charming person (any sex)
- la victime était inconsciente
- the victim was unconscious
- un témoin fiable
- a reliable witness (any sex)
- un mannequin connu
- a well-known model (any sex)
This produces sentences that look wrong to English speakers and are perfectly correct: Paul est une personne discrète.
Feminine Nouns FAQs
- What makes a noun feminine in French?
- Nothing about the object itself. Gender is a property the word inherited, mostly from Latin, and it shows up in the article and in every adjective and past participle that agrees with it: cette vieille maison a été vendue. For nouns naming people, the feminine is normally derived from the masculine.
- How do you make a French noun feminine?
- Add -e for most: un voisin becomes une voisine. Then the usual sub-patterns: -er becomes -ère, -eur becomes -euse, -teur becomes -trice, -ien becomes -ienne, -f becomes -ve. Nouns already ending in -e change only their article: un élève, une élève.
- Why is la victime feminine even for a man?
- Because agreement follows the noun, not the person. Victime, personne, vedette and recrue are grammatically feminine whoever they describe, so you say la victime a été transportée à l'hôpital about a man. Témoin and mannequin work the same way in the opposite direction.
- How do I know the gender of a noun starting with a vowel?
- The article won't help, since la and le both shorten to l'. Look at what agrees with it: l'eau est froide is feminine, l'hôtel est complet is masculine. Adding an adjective is the quickest way to check what you have learnt.
- Do French nouns change meaning depending on gender?
- A few dozen do, and they are worth knowing. La livre is a pound and le livre is a book; la tour is a tower and le tour is a trip; la poste is the post office and le poste is a job. In those cases the article is part of the word's meaning.