By Michael Cristiano Last updated:
Sometimes you just need to say “no.”
Like when you’re very happily married and a flirtatious guy asks to see you again.
Whether you’re planning a trip to a French-speaking country or you’re learning French for personal reasons, knowing how to say “no” is essential for communicating.
You can clear up a lot with la négation (negation), so let’s start with the basics and build from there, okay?
Contents
- Saying “No” in French and Using Basic Negation
- non
- ne … pas
- n’ … pas
- Some importantnotes onbasic negation
- More Ways to Say No in French
- Negative Adverbs
- pas encore(not yet)
- pas toujours(not always)
- pas du tout(not at all)
- ne … jamais(never)
- ne … nulle part(not anywhere)
- ne … plus(not anymore)
- Negative Adjectives
- aucun(e) andnul(le)
- Negative pronouns: personne(nobody/anybody) and rien (nothing)
- N’importe…
- Practicing French Negation
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Saying “No” in French and Using Basic Negation
non
Let’s get down to negation in its most basic form. The simplest way to negate something in French is to simply say non(no).
Note that the pronunciation of this word follows regular French pronunciation rules; the secondn is not pronounced, but rather theo is nasalized instead.
ne … pas
Next, let’s negate a basic sentence.To make a sentence negative in French, we use the words ne and pas. These two words surround the main verb in simple tenses (i.e. when there’s only one conjugated verb in the sentence). Check out these examples.
Jene parlepasespagnol.
(I don’t speak Spanish).
Ilnevapasà l’école demain.
(He’s not going to school tomorrow).
When the verb is conjugated in a compound tense such as thepassé composé, thene andpas surround only the first verb (also known as the “auxiliary verb” or the “helper verb”).
Nousnesommespasallés à la fête.
(We didn’t go to the party).
Ilsne sontpas arrivés hier.
(They didn’t arrive yesterday).
n’ … pas
Something important to note, though: When the verb followingne starts with a vowel, thene is shortened to simplyn’. Check it out:
Jen’aimepasce film.
(I don’t like that movie).
Iln’apaslu ce livre.
(He hasn’t read that book).
Some importantnotes onbasic negation
While speaking,it’s very common for French speakers todrop theneso that only the pasremains. This is informal, but it’s very common in spoken French.
For example,“Je ne sais pas”(I don’t know) would bespoken as“Je sais pas”in casualFrench.
Secondly, when there’s an indefinite article (such asunorune) or a partitive article (such asdu, de laor desbeing used to mean “some”) after a negative,the article changes to de.
J’aideslivres →Je n’ai pasdelivres.
(I have some books → I don’t have any books).
Finally, to negate infinitives in a sentence, both pieces of the negative adverb (neandpas)precede the infinitive verb.
Il est nécessaire dene pas mangeravant de faire du sport.
(It is necessary to not eat before doing sports).
Tu m’as dit dene pas lire ce livre.
(You told me not to read that book).
Ne pas ouvrir la fenêtre.
(Don’t open the window).
But wait! The fun doesn’t stop there! There are many more ways to use negative constructions in your everyday sentences.
More Ways to Say No in French
Negative Adverbs
While the ne… pas construction that we’ve covered above is technically a negative adverb, there are more. This means that other adverbs can be used in the place of pasor alongside pasin negative constructions to negate the action of the verb.
In other words, they’re used in the exact position thatpas would be in the phrase, or just afterpas if it too is included in the negative construction.
Check out these additional negativeadverbs:
pas encore(not yet)
Je n’ai pas encore vu ce film.
(I have not yet seen that movie).
pas toujours(not always)
Il n’a pas toujours habité en France.
(He has not always lived in France).
pas du tout(not at all)
Ellen’aime pas du tout le café.
(She doesn’t like coffee at all).
ne … jamais(never)
Nousn’avons jamais visité la Chine.
(We’ve never visited China).
ne … nulle part(not anywhere)
Tune l’as trouvénulle part.
(You didn’t find it anywhere).
ne … plus(not anymore)
Ils n’écrivent plusde lettres.
(They don’t write letters anymore).
Negative Adjectives
Like adverbs, adjectives can be used in the place ofpasin the negative construction.
This is different fromusing a negative adverb, however, because the adjective must negate a followingnoun and therefore doesn’t follow the helper verb if there is one.
aucun(e) andnul(le)
Both these negative adjectives (aucun andnul)have the meaning of “not any” and are used to meanthat there isn’t any of the noun that follows.
Additionally, these two negative adjectives must agree with the gender of the noun that follows. This means thataucun changes toaucune when followed by a feminine noun, andnul changes tonulle in front of a feminine noun as well.
Secondly,nul can only be used with uncountable nouns such as “water,” “money,” “love” and “sadness.”
Check out our two negative adjectives in action!
Jen’ai aucun livre.
(I don’t have any books).
Il n’a aucune confiance en elle.
(He doesn’thave any confidence inher).
Ils ne voient nul mal.
(They don’t see any harm).
Nous n’avons trouvé nulle eau.
(We haven’t found any water).
Negative pronouns: personne(nobody/anybody) and rien (nothing)
Negative pronouns are much the same because they can be used in the place ofpasin anegative construction.
Negative pronouns are different in three ways, though.
1.They negate the pronoun that replaces the noun.
2.When usedafter the verb, they can follow eitherthe helper verb orthe main verb in compound tenses.
3.They can be moved to the beginning of the sentence.
Confused yet? Let me explain.
Let’s sayI want to knowif you saw Pierre at a party last week. I might ask:
As-tu vu Pierre à la fête la semaine dernière ?
(Did you see Pierre at the party last week?)
Now, maybe you didn’t go to the party. So you might respond:
Je n’ai vu personne.
(I didn’t see anyone).
In this situation,personne is acting as a pronoun because it is technically replacing the nounPierre.
Got it? Good. Let’s look at another negative pronoun replacing a noun. In this case, the negative pronounrien (nothing) willreplacel’université(the university).
—As-tu visité l’université hier?
(Did you visit the university yesterday?)
—Non, je n’aivisité rien. /Non, je n’ai rien visité.
(No, I didn’t visit anything).
As you can see,riencomes after the main verb (visité) in the first option, and after the helper verb (ai) in the second. Both are correct.
Now, hold on! What about negative pronouns at the beginning of the sentence?
Yes, siree, French learner. These negative pronouns can be used as the subject (the doer of the verb). Check it out:
Personne n’est venu hier.
(No one came yesterday).
Rien ne peut m’arrêter.
(Nothing can stop me).
N’importe…
Just one more negative construction, I promise!
The expression n’importemeans “no matter,” “any” or “whichever” in French and can be followed by an interrogative adjective, adverb or pronoun.
Also note that when the construction includes quel(which), the word must agree in gender withthe following noun.Check out these examples below.
Je veux n’importe quel livre.
(I want any book).
Tu dois prendre n’importe quelle décision.
(You have to make whicheverdecision).
Je peux visiter n’importe quand.
(I can visit any time).
Fais-len’importe comment.
(Do it anywhich way).
Nous pouvons avoir notre rendez-vousn’importe où.
(We can have our meeting anywhere).
N‘importe qui peut le lire.
(Anyone can read it).
Il écouten’importe quoi.
(He listens to anything).
Practicing French Negation
Whew, that was a lot to take in, wasn’t it? Well, better follow it up with some practice.
To see all of these negation rules in action—and to experience all the many ways native speakers say “no,” in French, you should try to immerse yourself in authentic content. There’s a ton of is available online, and in modern language laerning programs.
For example, FluentU is a language learning program built on a library of authentic French videos with interactive captions. The captions let you see every word that’s spoken in a video, and you can hover over anything unfamiliar to get instant definitions, pronunciations and extra usage examples.
You can head on over to Lingoliafor a mix of exercises on all the negative constructions we’ve covered. Some have you choose the correct wordof negation between two options, and other types of questions have you rewrite positive sentences as negatives.
After that, UTexas has some slick fill-in-the-blankexercises as well, where you can check your answers.
Finally, About French and ProProfshave more quizzes to keep you reviewing those negative constructions for days.
Just don’tquit,okay?
See what I did there?
Download: This blog post is available as a convenient and portable PDF that you can take anywhere. Click here to get a copy. (Download)
