Qu’est-ce que le présent de l’indicatif ? – What is the French present tense?

In French grammar, the French present tense is used to talk about events taking place in the present. Is it? Is that so? 🤨

Yes, yes, I know, it’s a bit of a nonsense definition. Simply because the concept is obviously very easy to understand. But as you’ll see, there’s quite a lot to look at, firstly in terms of the actual use of this tense, and secondly in terms of the conjugation of verbs in this tense.

Quand utiliser le présent de l’indicatif ? – When to use the French present tense?

There isn’t a huge difference between the use of the present tense in French and English. In general, it’s used to talk about what’s topical, what’s true today, right now. There are, of course, a few structural differences, which we’ll look at in the next few sections.

Les faits dans le présent – Facts in the present

There’s nothing original about the use of the French present tense in this first section: it’s used to describe a fact, a piece of information that has always been true, for example, or at least is true in the present.

Les habitudes – Habits

The French present tense is used to talk about current habits, activities that you do on a regular basis.

Les événements dans un futur proche – Events in the foreseeable future

To talk about events that are going to happen soon, the French use either the future proche, a structure similar to the English one (to be going + infinitive), or the French present tense, especially when the probability of these events happening is very high.

Les actions qui ont commencé dans le passé et qui continuent aujourd’hui – Actions that began in the past and continue today

Here’s a real difference between the use of the present tense and the English language! In English, there are tenses for talking about events that began in the past and continue to take place in the present (English talks about duration using the present perfect simple or continuous tenses). But in French these tenses don’t exist! So it’s the present tense that’s used, in sentences that often include the structure “depuis …” (“since …”).

Les actions se déroulant maintenant – Actions taking place right now

Another tense that doesn’t exist in French: the present continuous tense 😳. In English, it is used to say that something is happening now (“is happening” is actually a good example of this tense). The French don’t bother with this tense. Instead, they use the French present tense. “How then do we know whether we’re talking about a general fact or an immediate situation?” you might ask. Well, it’s less obvious than in English, but normally, given the context, you should be able to guess pretty well. But it’s true that sometimes you wonder …

être en train de + infinitif – to be doing something

OK, so in French there is no equivalent tense to the present continuous … But there is a structure that can be used to express that something is happening right now. 😌 This is être + en train de + infinitive verb.

To use this structure, you need to conjugate the verb être, add the expression “en train de” (literally “in the train of” … 🚂 please don’t laugh 🤭) and finally add the verb you want to talk about, in the infinitive form.

Comment conjuguer les verbes au présent de l’indicatif ? – How to conjugate verbs in the French present tense?

Well well well… I am sorry but we won’t be able to give a precise answer to this question in this lesson. What is the reason? There are lots of ways of conjugating verbs in the present tense in French. Indeed, the conjugation rules change according to the ending of the infinitive verb.

So in this lesson I’ll give you some general information, but not the conjugation of ALL verbs in the French present tense. You’ll learn to conjugate the verbs as you go along.

As you may already know, French verbs are divided into 3 groups:

Les verbes du premier groupe, terminant en -er – First group verbs ending in -er

First group verbs are called regular verbs and luckily, most of the French verbs belong to this category 😅 For example, the verbs marcher (walk), parler (talk), chanter (sing), aimer (love), habiter (live), regarder (look), écouter (listen) and travailler (work) are all part of this group.

To conjugate these verbs, follow this simple recipe:

1. Take the verb in the infinitive form
2. Get rid of the ending –er
3. Add the following endings for each of the subjects:

As an exemple here comes the conjugation of the verb parler in the present tense:

Les verbes du deuxième groupe, terminant en -ir – Second group verbs ending in -ir

Verbs in the second group end in –ir in the infinitive form. All the verbs in this category follow the same conjugation rules. But be careful! Not all verbs ending in –ir are in the second group. There are also verbs with an infinitive ending in –ir that are not conjugated in the same way. These verbs then belong to the third group.

The most common second-group verbs are: finir (finish), choisir (choose), grandir (grow), réussir (succeed), applaudir (applaud), avertir (warn), obéir (obey), réflechir (reflect), fournir (provide), garantir (guarantee), grossir (fatten), mincir (slim), guérir (heal), ralentir (slow down), réagir (react), remplir (fill) and vieillir (age). But the full list is much longer (around 400 verbs in total…).

To conjugate these verbs, follow this simple recipe:

1. Take the verb in the infinitive form
2. Get rid of the ending –ir
3. Add the following endings for each of the subjects:

As an exemple here comes the conjugation of the verb finir in the present tense:

Les verbes du troisième groupe – Third group verbs

The third group includes all verbs that do not belong to either the first or second groups. Some verbs have a single conjugation: être (to be), avoir (to have), aller (to go), faire (to do). Other verbs form sub-groups because they end in the same way in the infinitive and therefore follow the same conjugation rules. All in all, there are many sub-groups and therefore many different ways of conjugating verbs in the third group.

This group contains around 485 verbs, far fewer than the number in the first group, which contains 90% of verbs. However, if we look at the list of French verbs by frequency, the ten most frequently used verbs in the French language all belong to the third conjugation group.

Les verbes qui terminent en -re – Verbs ending in -re

The largest subgroup is that of verbs ending in -re in the infinitive form. It is even considered to be the subgroup of regular third-group verbs. It includes the verbs vivre (live), construire (build), suivre (follow), conduire (drive), séduire (seduce) and others.

To conjugate these verbs, follow this recipe:

1. Take the verb in the infinitive form
2. Get rid of the ending -re or –vre
3. Add the following endings for each of the subjects:

As an exemple here comes the conjugation of the verb suivre in the present tense:

Les verbes du 3è groupe les plus fréquents et utiles – The most common and useful 3rd group verbs

To start speaking French, you’ll need to know how to conjugate lots of third group verbs, as some of them are used a lot. Look at the list below to see the lessons for the most common 3rd group verbs: