Les Subordonnées Comparatives: Plus que, Aussi que, Plus...plus

A comparison clause sets two things against each other along a measurable dimension — height, speed, intelligence, age, cost. French has a fully articulated system: dedicated structures for inequality (more / less than), equality (as much / as many as), and the proportional or correlative type that English renders with "the more ... the more." This page covers the full range, including the optional but stylistically important ne explétif, the irregular comparative pair meilleur / mieux (which conflates into a single English word "better"), and the small set of common errors that English speakers make over and over.

Comparisons are everywhere in real conversation — pricing, performance, opinions, descriptions of people. Mastering the patterns means you can talk fluently about the world in relative terms, not just absolute ones.

Inequality: plus que and moins que

The basic structure for inequality is plus (more) or moins (less) before the adjective, adverb, or noun, with que (than) introducing the second term. The thing modified determines the exact pattern.

With adjectives and adverbs:

The adjective agrees with what it modifies, like any other adjective: plus grand (masculine), plus grande (feminine), plus grands (masculine plural), plus grandes (feminine plural).

With nouns (quantity comparison): insert de. The pattern is plus de / moins de + noun + que.

The de is non-negotiable — plus livres without de is ungrammatical. This de is the same partitive marker you find after expressions of quantity (beaucoup de, peu de, trop de).

Pronouns after que: disjunctive (stressed) pronouns, never subject pronouns.

This is a hard rule. Plus grand que je would be ungrammatical (or at least sound like an unfinished sentence — see ne explétif below). The disjunctive pronoun set is moi, toi, lui, elle, nous, vous, eux, elles.

Equality: aussi que, autant que, autant de ... que

For equality (as ... as), the conjunction is que; the intensifier varies by what's being compared.

Adjectives and adverbs — aussi:

Verbs (action quantity) — autant que:

Nouns (count or quantity) — autant de ... que:

The pattern matches inequality: plus de / moins de / autant de — each requires de before the noun. Internalize the slot: intensifier + (de) + noun + que.

A subtle distinction worth noting: aussi is for adjectives and adverbs, while autant is for verbs and nouns. Aussi grand (as tall), autant travailler (work as much). Confusing the two is a common error — je travaille aussi que toi sounds wrong to a native ear; the correct form is je travaille autant que toi.

The negative comparison: pas si and pas aussi

In negative comparisons of equality, French has a slight stylistic split. Both pas aussi and pas si are correct; pas si is somewhat more colloquial.

In the second sentence, que ça is an idiomatic tag — "as that" / "as all that" — common in spoken French. You will hear it constantly.

Proportional comparison: plus...plus and moins...moins

French has a beautifully compact construction for proportional or parallel change: plus + clause + plus + clause or moins + clause + moins + clause. English does this with "the more ... the more," and the French version is structurally simpler — no article, just two parallel clauses.

You can mix plus and moins freely:

For nouns, you keep the de requirement:

This construction is high-frequency in French — much more common than its English equivalent. It works in writing and speech alike, and it has the stylistic virtue of being short and rhythmic. Use it whenever you want to express a parallel scale.

The ne explétif: a stylistic touch in comparisons

In careful or formal French, comparisons of inequality often include a ne in the second clause that does not negate anything. It is called the ne explétif — a leftover stylistic marker that softens or formalizes the construction.

The ne here is not a negation — qu'il ne le paraît doesn't mean "than he doesn't appear." It is a vestige of older French where the comparison logically implied a kind of negation ("more than he appears not to be"). Modern French has dropped that logic but kept the marker as a sign of careful style.

The ne explétif is optional. It is more common in writing than in speech. In casual conversation, you can omit it freely:

The ne explétif also appears after avant que, à moins que, de peur que — but in those contexts it is similarly optional and stylistic.

Meilleur vs mieux: the better/better split

English uses the single word "better" for both adjectival and adverbial comparison: a better book, he sings better. French splits these into two distinct words:

• meilleur is the adjective: un meilleur livre (a better book), une meilleure idée (a better idea).
• mieux is the adverb: il chante mieux (he sings better), je me sens mieux (I feel better).

This is the comparative form of the irregular pair bon (good — adjective) and bien (well — adverb).

The agreement on meilleur follows ordinary adjective rules: meilleur, meilleure, meilleurs, meilleures. Mieux is invariable, like all adverbs.

The contrast that traps English speakers: Ce gâteau est mieux is wrong (or substandard) — you want the adjective, so Ce gâteau est meilleur. Il joue meilleur que moi is wrong — you want the adverb, so Il joue mieux que moi. The English habit of using "better" everywhere produces transfer errors in both directions.

Plus mauvais vs pire: another double form

A parallel split exists for "worse," though here both forms are usable in many contexts.

• plus mauvais / pire as adjectives: un plus mauvais résultat / un pire résultat (a worse result). Pire is more emphatic and abstract; plus mauvais is more neutral and concrete.
• plus mal / pire for some adverbial uses, though pire as an adverb is colloquial; the standard adverbial comparison is plus mal.

For abstract nouns and intensified comparisons, pire is the natural choice. For concrete attributes (taste, smell, technical quality), plus mauvais may sound more appropriate.

Comme: similarity, not comparison of degree

A separate construction with comme expresses similarity rather than degree comparison. Comme introduces a model or a manner.

This is not the same as aussi ... que — comme un oiseau doesn't say "as much as a bird" but "in the manner of a bird." Use comme for resemblance, aussi/autant ... que for measurable equality.

A literary cousin is tel que (such as / like), used for explicit comparison or example:

Common Mistakes

Using subject pronouns after que

After que in comparisons, French requires the disjunctive form: moi, toi, lui, elle, nous, vous, eux, elles. The subject form (je, tu, il, ...) cannot stand alone here.

Forgetting de with quantity nouns

Whenever you compare quantities of a noun, the de is required: plus de, moins de, autant de. This parallels other quantity expressions in French.

Confusing aussi and autant

Aussi is for adjectives and adverbs (aussi grand, aussi vite); autant is for verbs and nouns (autant travailler, autant de livres). The split is rigid.

Treating meilleur and mieux as interchangeable

If the word answers "what kind?" use meilleur (adjective). If it answers "how?" use mieux (adverb). This split mirrors bon / bien in their positive form.

Reading the ne explétif as negation

The ne explétif has no negative meaning. When you see ne without pas in a comparison or after certain conjunctions, treat it as a stylistic flourish.

Key Takeaways

French comparison divides cleanly into three patterns: inequality with plus/moins ... que (with disjunctive pronouns and obligatory de before nouns), equality with aussi/autant ... que (split between adjectives/adverbs and verbs/nouns), and proportional change with plus...plus / moins...moins. The ne explétif is an optional stylistic marker in inequality comparisons — useful to recognize, optional in production. The meilleur / mieux contrast — and the parallel bon / bien and plus mauvais / pire / plus mal — forces you to keep adjectival and adverbial comparison distinct in a way English does not.

Once you have the patterns automatized, French comparisons are actually more transparent than English, because each grammatical role gets its own marker. The price is having to memorize the pieces; the reward is sentences that fall into place precisely.