L'Accord des Adjectifs

Adjective agreement is the system that forces a French adjective to match its noun in gender (masculine or feminine) and number (singular or plural). This means that for almost every adjective you learn, you actually learn four forms — and you need to be able to switch between them on the fly, every time you speak or write. This page lays out the default rule, then walks through the eight systematic exceptions where the ending of the adjective itself dictates a different pattern. By the end you should be able to hear or read a masculine singular adjective for the first time and predict its feminine and plural confidently — or at least narrow the possibilities to two or three patterns based on the ending.

The default rule

Take the masculine singular form. To get the feminine, add -e. To get the plural, add -s. To get the feminine plural, add -es.

This is the pattern for the vast majority of adjectives: grand / grande / grands / grandes, fort / forte / forts / fortes, intelligent / intelligente / intelligents / intelligentes, fatigué / fatiguée / fatigués / fatiguées, content / contente / contents / contentes, vert / verte / verts / vertes.

What agreement sounds like

Whether the agreement is audible depends on what comes after the consonant. In petit the final -t is silent; adding the feminine -e "wakes up" the consonant: petit /pəti/ vs petite /pətit/. Same for grand (/ɡʁɑ̃/) → grande (/ɡʁɑ̃d/), vert (/vɛʁ/) → verte (/vɛʁt/), français (/fʁɑ̃sɛ/) → française (/fʁɑ̃sɛz/). In these cases the agreement is real, audible information.

But many adjectives sound identical in masculine and feminine: joli / jolie (both /ʒɔli/), fatigué / fatiguée (both /fatiɡe/), bleu / bleue (both /blø/). Those silent agreements are still mandatory in writing. The plural -s is almost always silent, so petit and petits sound the same — the article (un vs des) carries the number.

The systematic exceptions

Eight ending patterns trigger predictable variations on the default rule. Memorize each one with a couple of high-frequency examples; once the patterns are familiar you can predict the feminine of an adjective you have never seen before.

Adjectives already ending in -e

If the masculine singular already ends in a silent -e, the feminine is identical. Adding another -e would be redundant.

Common examples: rouge, jaune, rose, jeune, facile, difficile, triste, pratique, calme, moderne, sympathique, timide, honnête, libre, autre. The plural still adds -s: des voitures rouges, des questions difficiles.

This is not an exception that affects only some adjectives — it is universal. If the masculine ends in silent -e, the feminine cannot add a second one. Note that adjectives ending in -é (with an accent, like fatigué) follow the default pattern: feminine fatiguée with both letters present, because the -é is a vowel that takes a separate written -e in agreement.

-er → -ère

Adjectives ending in -er take a grave accent on the e and add the feminine -e: cher → chère, premier → première, fier → fière, léger → légère, dernier → dernière, familier → familière, étranger → étrangère.

The grave accent is mandatory: writing chere without it is a spelling mistake, just as omitting the accent on père would be.

-eux → -euse

Adjectives ending in -eux form their feminine in -euse: heureux → heureuse, sérieux → sérieuse, curieux → curieuse, amoureux → amoureuse, paresseux → paresseuse, dangereux → dangereuse, peureux → peureuse, nombreux → nombreuse, délicieux → délicieuse.

The masculine plural is identical to the masculine singular — heureux in both cases, because -x counts as a plural marker already. So un homme heureux / des hommes heureux. The feminine plural adds -s normally: des femmes heureuses.

-eur → -euse (most cases) and -teur → -trice (verb-derived)

Adjectives ending in -eur describing a behavior or characteristic usually take -euse in the feminine: menteur → menteuse (lying / a liar), travailleur → travailleuse (hard-working), trompeur → trompeuse (deceptive), flatteur → flatteuse (flattering), moqueur → moqueuse (mocking).

A subset of -teur adjectives derived from verbs takes -trice instead: créateur → créatrice, protecteur → protectrice, séducteur → séductrice, destructeur → destructrice, évocateur → évocatrice. The rough rule of thumb is: if the adjective comes from a Latin-style verb (often with a corresponding noun in -tion), expect -trice. The full pattern is detailed on the feminine formation page.

A small set of -eur comparative adjectives takes a regular -e: meilleur → meilleure, supérieur → supérieure, inférieur → inférieure, intérieur → intérieure, extérieur → extérieure, antérieur → antérieure, postérieur → postérieure, majeur → majeure, mineur → mineure. These are mostly Latin comparatives and they refuse to take -euse.

-f → -ve

Adjectives ending in -f turn the f into v and add -e: actif → active, sportif → sportive, naïf → naïve, neuf → neuve, vif → vive, attentif → attentive, productif → productive, créatif → créative, positif → positive.

The plural is built normally on each form: actifs / actives. Neuf preserves its diaeresis-free spelling but the cousin adjective naïf keeps the diaeresis on the i in both forms: naïf / naïve / naïfs / naïves.

-c → -che or -c → -que

Adjectives ending in -c split between two patterns. The most common is -c → -che: blanc → blanche, sec → sèche (with grave accent), franc → franche.

A smaller group takes -c → -que: public → publique, turc → turque, grec → grecque (note the double c), caduc → caduque, ammoniac → ammoniaque. These are mostly nationality and technical adjectives.

-on → -onne and -en → -enne (consonant doubling)

Adjectives ending in -on and -en double the n before adding the feminine -e: bon → bonne, mignon → mignonne, breton → bretonne; parisien → parisienne, européen → européenne, italien → italienne, canadien → canadienne, ancien → ancienne, moyen → moyenne.

The doubled n is pronounced no differently from a single n — it is purely a spelling device that signals "feminine here." Without the doubling, the masculine bon (with its nasal vowel /bɔ̃/) would be the natural reading.

A handful of other adjectives double their final consonant in the same way: gentil → gentille, gros → grosse, bas → basse, épais → épaisse, gras → grasse, las → lasse, muet → muette, net → nette, coquet → coquette. The doubled-consonant signal is consistent: it forces the consonant to be pronounced and prevents the vowel from staying "open" or nasal.

-et → -ette (mostly) but sometimes -ète

Most -et adjectives double the t: muet → muette, net → nette, cadet → cadette, coquet → coquette, fluet → fluette. But a small group takes a grave accent and a single t: complet → complète, concret → concrète, discret → discrète, inquiet → inquiète, secret → secrète, replet → replète. There is no shortcut — these must be memorized as a closed set.

Plural formation

The plural usually adds -s to whatever form (masculine or feminine) you are working with. Petit → petits, petite → petites. But three patterns deviate.

-s and -x endings: no change in masculine plural

If a masculine singular adjective already ends in -s or -x, the masculine plural is identical: gris → gris, français → français, jaloux → jaloux, heureux → heureux, vieux → vieux.

The feminine forms still add -s normally: jalouse → jalouses, française → françaises. Only the masculine is unchanged in the plural, because the consonant is already a "plural-style" ending.

-al → -aux

Most adjectives ending in -al take -aux in the masculine plural: national → nationaux, général → généraux, principal → principaux, régional → régionaux, international → internationaux, amical → amicaux, spécial → spéciaux.

The feminine plural is regular: nationale → nationales. So you get un journal national, des journaux nationaux, une équipe nationale, des équipes nationales.

A short list of exceptions takes a regular -s in the masculine plural: banal → banals, fatal → fatals, final → finals (sometimes also finaux), naval → navals, bancal → bancals, natal → natals. Most of these refer to things that come in unique sets (a final, a navy, a birthplace) rather than countable everyday items.

-eau → -eaux

Adjectives ending in -eau take -eaux in the masculine plural: beau → beaux, nouveau → nouveaux, jumeau → jumeaux.

The feminines are belle → belles, nouvelle → nouvelles, jumelle → jumelles — regular plurals.

Why English speakers find this hard

In English, the plural and feminine are simply not on the adjective's radar. You say a tall woman, tall women, tall men — tall never moves. French, by contrast, asks you to do gender and number agreement on every single adjective in every single sentence. The difficulty is not the rules themselves (most are mechanical) but the simultaneity: while you are constructing a sentence in real time, you have to track the gender of each noun and apply the right agreement to each adjective, often more than one in the same sentence.

The good news: agreement is mostly silent in spoken French. Petit / petite sounds different, but joli / jolie / jolis / jolies are all pronounced /ʒɔli/. So in conversation, getting agreement wrong is mostly a writing problem; in writing, getting it right is a matter of disciplined practice. Reading aloud what you write — and double-checking that every adjective matches its noun — is the single most efficient way to consolidate the habit.

Common mistakes

The first two errors come from English speakers underestimating how strict agreement is. The third is a near-universal mistake at A1 because cher and chère sound identical (both /ʃɛʁ/) — but the grave accent is mandatory in writing. The fourth is a diacritic slip on the cedilla, which is just as much a spelling mistake as a missing dot on an i. The fifth is a transfer of the default -s plural to the -al class — a slip that even some native speakers occasionally make in writing.

Key takeaways

• Default: masculine + -e = feminine; + -s = plural; + -es = feminine plural.
• -e endings: no feminine change.
• -er → -ère (with grave accent), -eux → -euse, -eur → -euse (or -trice for verb-derived), -f → -ve.
• -c → -che or -c → -que; -on → -onne, -en → -enne with consonant doubling.
• -et mostly doubles the t (-ette) but a closed list takes -ète.
• Plural: -s default; -s/-x unchanged in m. pl.; -al → -aux (with the banal/fatal/final/naval exceptions); -eau → -eaux.

Once you internalize these patterns, agreement becomes automatic for the vast majority of adjectives. The remaining genuinely irregular forms — beau / belle, vieux / vieille, fou / folle, and friends — are covered on the irregular feminines page. Master those last; everything else here is mechanical.