Garder Conjugation: All Tenses of the French Verb “garder”
Written by Camille Laurent, Lead French Curriculum Editor · Reviewed August 2026
Garder means “to keep” and also “to look after”. It is a fully regular -er verb, so the table holds no surprises; the work is in its range of meanings, from keeping a receipt to babysitting to keeping your temper.
Garder is one of the first hundred verbs you need. It covers keeping something you already have (garde la monnaie), holding on to it for later (je garde ça pour demain), and taking care of someone or something (garder les enfants, garder un chien). It also anchors a long list of set phrases about self-control and health: garder son calme, garder le lit, garder la forme. Because it is regular, it is a good verb to use for drilling the -er endings while learning genuinely useful vocabulary.
Garder conjugates like parler with no deviation at all: je garde, tu gardes, il garde, nous gardons, vous gardez, ils gardent. The imparfait is je gardais, the future je garderai, the conditional je garderais, the subjunctive que je garde, and the participle gardé with avoir. The g stays hard everywhere because the vowel after it is always a or e followed by a consonant, so unlike protéger or manger it never needs an inserted e. The forms that sound alike are worth noting: garde, gardes and gardent are all pronounced identically, and only the written ending distinguishes them.
Garder in context
Présent
Je garde les enfants de ma sœur le samedi soir. I babysit my sister's kids on Saturday evenings.
Imparfait
Elle gardait toujours un double des clés chez le voisin. She always kept a spare set of keys at the neighbour's.
Passé composé
Nous avons gardé la même adresse pendant dix ans. We kept the same address for ten years.
Futur simple
Tu garderas ta place si tu arrives avant midi. You'll keep your seat if you get there before noon.
Subjonctif présent
Il faut que vous gardiez le ticket jusqu'à la sortie. You have to keep your ticket until you leave.
Common mistakes with garder
Using regarder for looking after someone
✗ Je regarde les enfants ce soir.
✓ Je garde les enfants ce soir. — I'm looking after the kids tonight.
English “to watch the kids” pulls learners towards regarder, but regarder only means to look at something. Garder is the verb for taking care of a person or an animal: garder les enfants, garder le chien des voisins. Je regarde les enfants means you are sitting there watching them.
Using garder where French needs rester
✗ Je garde à la maison ce soir.
✓ Je reste à la maison ce soir. — I'm staying home tonight.
Garder is transitive: something or someone is kept. It cannot mean “to stay” on its own. For remaining somewhere, use rester. The overlap in English (“keep to the house”, “stay in”) does not exist in French, and the fixed phrase garder le lit is the exception rather than the rule.
Making the participle agree after avoir
✗ J'ai gardée la lettre pendant des années.
✓ J'ai gardé la lettre pendant des années. — I kept the letter for years.
With avoir, the past participle agrees only with a direct object that comes before it. La lettre follows, so the participle stays gardé. The agreement does appear when the object moves in front: la lettre que j'ai gardée, or je l'ai gardée.
Expressions with garder
garder son calme
to keep your cool
garder un secret
to keep a secret
garder le lit
to stay in bed (when ill)
garder la forme
to stay in shape
garde la monnaie
keep the change
prendre garde
to be careful, to watch out
Frequently asked questions
Is garder a regular verb?
Yes. Garder is a first-group -er verb with a completely stable stem and no spelling adjustments: je garde, nous gardons, j'ai gardé, je garderai, que je garde. That makes it a good model verb — whatever you learn about its endings transfers directly to the thousands of other -er verbs.
How do you say “to babysit” in French?
Garder les enfants is the ordinary way: je garde les enfants ce soir, elle a gardé mon fils pendant les vacances. Faire du babysitting also exists and is used mostly by and about teenagers doing it for money. The person is une baby-sitter or, in official contexts, une garde d'enfants.
What is the difference between garder and conserver?
Garder is the everyday word and works for objects, people and abstractions: garder un ticket, garder son calme. Conserver is more formal and focuses on preservation over time, especially of food and documents: conserver au réfrigérateur, conserver ses relevés bancaires. In many sentences garder is simply the more natural choice.
What is the past participle of garder?
Gardé, used with avoir: j'ai gardé, nous avons gardé. It agrees with a preceding direct object, giving forms like la place que j'ai gardée and les photos qu'il a gardées. As an adjective, gardé appears in phrases such as un parking gardé and une propriété bien gardée.
How do you pronounce garde, gardes and gardent?
All three sound exactly the same: one syllable, a hard g, and a silent ending, roughly “gard”. The -es and -ent endings add nothing audible. This is why dictation exercises use -er verbs so often — the only way to choose the right ending is to identify the subject.