French Pronouns: Subject, Object, Relative, and Everything Between

Pronouns

• Relative Pronouns Que Qui — Qui and que are the two relative pronouns that attach a description to a noun. Qui is the subject of the clause it opens (l'homme qui parle), que is its direct object (l'homme que je vois). The choice has nothing to do with people versus things: it depends entirely on what is missing from the clause.
• Tout Pronoun — As a pronoun, tout means everything, while tous and toutes mean all of them or all of us. Unlike the adjective tout, the pronoun stands alone with no noun after it, and in compound tenses it slides in front of the past participle: j'ai tout compris. The final s of the pronoun tous is pronounced, which is the one reliable way to hear the difference.
• Me and Te — Me and te are the object pronouns for me and you in French. They cover direct objects (il me voit), indirect objects (il me parle) and reflexives (je me lave) with the same single form, they elide to m' and t' before a vowel, and they sit in front of the verb rather than after it. In a positive command they swap to moi and toi.
• Elle and Elles — 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.
• Subject Pronoun on — On is a third-person singular subject pronoun that covers we, one, people in general, and an unnamed someone. It takes the same verb form as il and elle no matter which of those it means, and in everyday speech it has largely replaced nous. It is also the standard way French avoids the passive: on m'a volé mon vélo.
• Subject Pronouns Tu vs. Vous — French has two words for you. Tu addresses one person you're close to, and vous addresses either several people or one person you're being polite to. The choice is not optional and it changes the verb, the possessives, the object pronouns and the imperative, so it has to be settled before you open your mouth.
• Subject Pronouns — The French subject pronouns are je, tu, il, elle, on, nous, vous, ils and elles. They tell you who is doing the verb and they cannot be left out, so every French clause needs either a noun subject or one of these nine words. Two of them have no simple English equivalent: on, which covers we and people in general, and elle, which also means it.
• Indirect Objects — An indirect object is a person the verb reaches through the preposition à: je parle à Marie. The pronouns that replace it are me, te, lui, nous, vous and leur, they go in front of the verb, and they never make the past participle agree. Lui and leur carry no gender, so lui covers both to him and to her.
• Lui — Lui is two different pronouns wearing the same clothes. In front of a verb it is the indirect object meaning to him or to her, with no gender at all: je lui écris. After a preposition or standing alone it is the stressed pronoun meaning him, and there it is strictly masculine: avec lui, c'est lui.
• Possessive Pronouns — The French possessive pronouns are le mien, le tien, le sien, le nôtre, le vôtre and le leur, plus their feminine and plural forms. They mean mine, yours, his and so on, they always keep their definite article, and they agree with the thing owned rather than with the owner: la mienne for a car, le mien for a bike.
• Demonstrative Pronouns — The French demonstrative pronouns are celui, celle, ceux and celles, meaning the one or the ones. They agree with the noun they replace and they can never stand alone: each has to be completed by -ci, by -là, by de, or by a relative clause. Alongside them sit the neuter forms ce, ceci, cela and ça, which point at ideas rather than at nouns.
• Que and Qui — Que and qui are two of the busiest words in French. Between them they cover who, whom, what, that, than and only: qui asks and answers who, while que introduces subordinate clauses, comparisons, exclamations and the restrictive ne… que. Sorting out which job a given que or qui is doing is mostly a matter of looking at the words around it.
• Nous and Vous — Nous means we and us; vous means you in the plural and you in the polite singular. Each is a single invariable form that serves as subject, direct object, indirect object, reflexive pronoun and stressed pronoun, which makes them the two easiest pronouns in French to spell and the two easiest to misplace.
• Direct Objects — A direct object is what the verb acts on with no preposition in between: je vois la maison. The pronouns that replace it are me, te, le, la, nous, vous and les, and unlike English they go in front of the verb: je la vois. In compound tenses a direct object placed before the verb makes the past participle agree with it.
• En Adverbial Pronoun — The pronoun en replaces any phrase introduced by de: a partitive (du pain), a quantity (trois livres), a place you've come from (de Lyon), or the complement of a verb like parler de. It sits in front of the verb, it never changes shape, and it never makes a past participle agree. English usually translates it as some, any, of it or about it, and often not at all.
• Object Pronouns — French object pronouns replace the nouns a verb acts on, and unlike English they stand in front of the verb: je le vois, il me parle. There are three sets working together, the direct pronouns le, la, les, the indirect pronouns lui, leur, and the adverbial pronouns y and en, plus me, te, nous and vous, which do both jobs. When two of them meet, the order is fixed.
• Lequel — Lequel is the French for which one, and it does two jobs: it asks a question when the noun has already been mentioned, and it acts as a relative pronoun after a preposition. It has four forms and merges with à and de to give auquel, duquel, auxquelles, and the rest of the family.
• Ne Plus — Ne… plus is the French for no longer, not any more, and no more. Plus simply takes the slot that pas would occupy, so je ne fume pas becomes je ne fume plus. Before a noun it behaves like a quantity word and takes bare de: il n'y a plus de pain.
• Personal Pronouns — French personal pronouns come in five parallel series: subject (je, tu, il), direct object (me, le, les), indirect object (me, lui, leur), reflexive (me, te, se) and stressed (moi, toi, lui, eux). The same person is expressed by a different word in each series, and the series is chosen by the grammatical job, not by the meaning.
• Pronoun Le Can Also Replace Adjectives — Besides replacing a masculine noun, le has a second life as a neuter pronoun standing for an adjective, a profession, or a whole idea. In that use it never changes to la or les, however feminine or plural the thing it refers to: elle est médecin, et elle le sera longtemps. English usually leaves it out altogether, which is why it goes unnoticed for so long.
• Reflexive Pronouns — The reflexive pronouns are me, te, se, nous, vous and se. They point the verb back at its own subject, so je me lave means I wash myself. They also carry the reciprocal meaning each other, and they turn ordinary verbs into pronominal ones whose auxiliary in the past is être rather than avoir.
• Relative Pronoun Dont — Dont is the relative pronoun that swallows a de. It covers English whose, of which, and about which, and it appears whenever the verb, the adjective, or the possession inside the relative clause would have required de. Le livre dont je parle comes from parler de ce livre.
• Relative Pronouns — French relative pronouns — qui, que, où, dont and lequel — attach a describing clause to the noun it describes. Which one you need depends on the job the pronoun does inside its own clause, not on whether the noun is a person or a thing. Unlike English, French never lets you drop the pronoun.
• Stressed Pronouns — The French stressed pronouns — moi, toi, lui, elle, nous, vous, eux, elles — are the forms a pronoun takes when it has to stand on its own two feet. You need them after a preposition, after c'est, in comparisons, in one-word answers, and whenever you want to put weight on who you are talking about.
• Qui as a Relative Pronoun — Qui is the relative pronoun that fills a subject gap, and it translates as who, which or that depending on the English sentence. Because it is the subject of its own clause, a conjugated verb comes straight after it, and it works for people and objects alike.
• Adverbial Pronouns — French has two adverbial pronouns, y and en, and between them they replace a whole prepositional phrase. Y stands in for something introduced by à, dans, sur or en; en stands in for something introduced by de or by a quantity. Both are tiny, both sit in front of the verb, and both are almost impossible to leave out.
• Indefinite Demonstrative Pronouns — Ce, ceci, cela and ça are the demonstrative pronouns that point at something without naming it: a situation, an idea, an object you can gesture at. Because they refer to nothing with a gender, they never change form — and the only real decision left is which register you want, since ça is spoken and cela is written.
• Interrogative Pronouns — French interrogative pronouns ask who and what. The system is organised around two questions: is the answer a person or a thing, and is it the subject or the object of the verb. That gives you qui, que, quoi and the long forms qu'est-ce qui and qu'est-ce que, plus lequel when you are choosing from a known set.
• Tout le Monde — Everybody in French is tout le monde, literally all the world, and the phrase behaves as a singular even though it refers to a crowd. Its neighbours divide the work up differently: tous and toutes mean all of them, chacun means each one, and les gens covers people in general.
• Neuter Object Pronoun — Alongside the ordinary object pronouns le, la and les, French has a neuter le that replaces something with no gender at all: an adjective, an infinitive, or a whole clause. Because there is nothing for it to agree with, it never becomes la or les, and English usually leaves it out entirely.
• On vs. L'on — L'on is the same pronoun as on with a decorative l' in front of it, a leftover of the old noun l'homme. It is never required: French writers use it after si, que, et, ou, où and a few other short words to make the sentence sound smoother, and leave plain on everywhere else.
• Relative Pronoun Ou — Où with a grave accent is the relative pronoun that stands in for a place or a moment: la ville où j'habite, le jour où tu es parti. English switches to when for the time use, but French keeps où throughout, and the accent is what separates it from ou meaning or.
• Ce Que and Ce Qui — Ce qui and ce que both mean what, and the choice between them has nothing to do with meaning. Ce qui is the subject of the clause that follows, so a verb comes next; ce que is its object, so a subject comes next. Everything else about the two is identical.
• Negative Pronouns — Rien, personne, aucun and nul are pronouns that carry the negative meaning themselves, so they replace the pas in ne … pas rather than joining it. Each keeps the ne in front of the verb, and where each one sits in a compound tense is the detail that separates a fluent sentence from a clumsy one.
• Relative Pronoun Lequel — Lequel is the relative pronoun you need after a preposition when the antecedent is a thing. It is the only relative pronoun that agrees, giving lequel, laquelle, lesquels and lesquelles, and it contracts with à and de to produce auquel, duquel and their plurals.
• À Qui, Auquel, and À Laquelle — When a relative clause needs the preposition à, French offers two routes: à qui for people, and auquel, à laquelle, auxquels or auxquelles for things. Both keep the preposition at the front of the clause, and which one you use depends only on whether the antecedent is human.
• Direct vs. Indirect Objects — A direct object is what the verb acts on with no preposition; an indirect object is introduced by à. The distinction only becomes visible in the third person, where a direct object gives le, la or les and an indirect object gives lui or leur — and where French and English disagree about which verbs take which.
• Y Adverbial Pronoun — Y is a single letter that replaces a whole phrase: a place, or anything introduced by the preposition à. It goes in front of the verb, it works for things and ideas but not for people, and it hides inside some of the most common expressions in French, starting with il y a.
• Indefinite Relative Pronouns — An indefinite relative pronoun is a relative pronoun with no noun in front of it. French builds the whole family from the placeholder ce: ce qui, ce que, ce dont, ce à quoi. Each corresponds to an ordinary relative pronoun, and each turns a clause into something that behaves like a noun.
• Indefinite Relative Pronouns Ce Dont Quoi — Ce dont is what you use when the verb inside the clause is built with de and there is no noun to attach to: ce dont j'ai besoin, ce dont on parle. With any other preposition the form is ce plus that preposition plus quoi — ce à quoi, ce sur quoi, ce en quoi.
• Double Pronoun Order — When two object pronouns share a verb, French fixes their order for you: me, te, se, nous, vous come first, then le, la, les, then lui, leur, then y, then en. The affirmative imperative is the one construction that reshuffles the sequence, and it is the only exception you have to learn separately.
• Chaque, Chacun, and Chacune — Chaque is an adjective and needs a singular noun behind it: chaque jour, chaque personne. Chacun and chacune are pronouns and stand alone: chacun a son avis. English uses each for both jobs, which is why French forces a decision English never asks you to make.
• Interrogative Pronoun Lequel — Lequel is the interrogative pronoun that means which one. It replaces a noun already known from the conversation, agrees with it in gender and number, and is written as a single word — le quel as two words is not a form of it.
• Stressed Pronoun Soi — Soi is the stressed pronoun used when the subject is nobody in particular: on, chacun, tout le monde, personne, or an infinitive. Where a named subject takes lui or elle, an impersonal one takes soi, and it turns up in a long list of fixed phrases from chez soi to cela va de soi.
• Tout Ce Qui and Tout Ce Que — Tout ce qui and tout ce que both mean everything that or all that. Qui is used when a verb follows immediately, because the thing is doing the action, and que when a subject and verb follow, because the thing is receiving it. Tout stays invariable in both, and the pair extends to tout ce dont and tout ce à quoi.
• Ce Qui What Which Relative Pronouns — Ce qui and ce que mean what, in the sense of the thing that. They are used when there is no noun for the relative pronoun to attach to, so ce supplies one. Ce qui takes over when the missing thing is the subject of the clause, and ce que when it is the object.
• Impersonal Pronouns — An impersonal pronoun fills the subject slot without referring to anybody. French uses il for weather, time, necessity, and existence, ce and ça to point at a situation, and on for people in general. All of them take a third-person singular verb, however many things the sentence is really about.
• Indefinite Pronouns — Indefinite pronouns stand in for people or things you can't or won't name: quelqu'un, quelque chose, chacun, plusieurs, certains, personne, rien. They replace a whole noun phrase rather than sitting in front of a noun, and most of them are treated as third-person singular.
• Object Pronoun Placement — French object pronouns go in front of the verb they belong to, not after it: je le vois, I see him. In compound tenses they sit before the auxiliary, with an infinitive they attach to the infinitive, and only the affirmative imperative pushes them behind the verb.
• Pronouns and Adjectives 1S — The French first person singular has one meaning but six shapes. Je is the subject, me the object, moi the stressed form, mon, ma and mes the possessives, and le mien the possessive pronoun. Adjectives describing you also agree with your own gender: je suis content or je suis contente.
• Le, La, and Les as Direct Objects — Le, la, l' and les replace a noun that the verb acts on directly, with no preposition in between: je vois la maison becomes je la vois. Le stands for a masculine noun, la for a feminine one, les for any plural, and both singular forms shrink to l' before a vowel.
• Informal Pronouns — Casual French uses a smaller, blunter set of pronouns than the textbook one: tu rather than vous, on rather than nous, ça for both people and things, and a stressed pronoun doubled up in front of the subject. None of it is incorrect, but all of it signals that you are speaking rather than writing.
• Lui and Leur as Indirect Objects — Lui and leur replace a person the verb reaches through à. Lui covers to him and to her with no gender distinction, leur covers to them and never takes an -s as a pronoun, and both go in front of the verb: je lui parle, je leur réponds.

Overviews

The map of the whole system, if you want it before the detail.

• En (Pronoun and Preposition) — En is three different words that happen to be spelled alike. As a preposition it means in, to, by or made of: en France, en janvier, en bois. As a pronoun it replaces de plus a noun and means of it, about it or some: j'en ai deux. And in front of a present participle it builds the gerund: en sortant, on the way out.