French spelling looks intimidating because it does two things English doesn't: it marks pronunciation with diacritics (the little signs above and below letters), and it preserves a thick layer of silent letters that haven't been pronounced for centuries but still encode etymology and grammatical information. Once you understand the logic — what each diacritic does, why French keeps those silent letters, and how the apostrophe stitches words together — French orthography stops being chaotic and starts being one of the most internally consistent spelling systems in Europe.
This page is the map. Every subtopic has its own dedicated page; the goal here is to give you the whole layout in one read.
The five diacritics
French uses five diacritical marks. Each one changes either the pronunciation, the meaning, or both. They are not optional: omitting an accent is a spelling error, not a stylistic shortcut. Été (summer) and ete are not variants — only the first is a French word.
| Mark | Name | Letters | What it does | Example |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ´ | accent aigu (acute) | é only | marks closed /e/ sound | été, café, écouter |
| ` | accent grave (grave) | è, à, ù | on è: open /ɛ/; on à and ù: distinguishes homographs | mère, à (vs a), où (vs ou) |
| ˆ | accent circonflexe (circumflex) | â, ê, î, ô, û | often marks a historical lost s; sometimes changes sound | forêt (cf. forest), hôpital, île, dû |
| ¸ | cédille (cedilla) | ç only | keeps c soft (/s/) before a, o, u | ça, garçon, reçu, leçon |
| ¨ | tréma (diaeresis) | ë, ï, ü | splits two vowels that would otherwise blend | naïf, Noël, ambiguïté |
Accent aigu (é)
The acute accent appears only on e and marks the closed sound /e/, like the ay in English say without the gliding off-sound.
J'ai étudié le français pendant cinq années.
I studied French for five years.
Elle a préféré rester à la maison.
She preferred to stay at home.
All past participles of -er verbs carry é: parlé, mangé, étudié, allé, donné. The acute is also the marker of many learned/Latin-derived words: étude, télévision, école.
Accent grave (è, à, ù)
The grave accent does two completely different jobs depending on which vowel it's on:
- On e (è): marks the open /ɛ/ sound, like English bet. Distinguishes mère (mother) from mer (sea) — different vowel sounds.
- On a and u (à, ù): marks no sound difference; its sole job is to distinguish homographs. à (preposition "to") vs a (verb "has"). où (where) vs ou (or). là (there) vs la (the).
Je vais à Paris où ma sœur habite.
I'm going to Paris where my sister lives.
Mon père et ma mère vivent près de la mer.
My father and my mother live near the sea.
There is exactly one French word with ù in everyday use: où (where). Every other use of the grave on u is a curiosity. The acute vs grave distinction on e is treated in depth on spelling/accent-grave-vs-aigu.
Accent circonflexe (â, ê, î, ô, û)
The circumflex is the most semantically loaded of the diacritics. Historically, it marks a letter that has dropped out of the word — usually an s. Knowing this gives you a free vocabulary trick: many circumflex words have English cognates with the s still in place.
| French | English cognate | What disappeared |
|---|---|---|
| forêt | forest | s |
| hôpital | hospital | s |
| île | isle | s |
| côte | coast | s |
| fenêtre | (window) — from older 'fenestre' | s |
| août | August | vowel collapse |
Nous avons passé l'été sur la côte.
We spent the summer on the coast.
Il a été à l'hôpital pendant trois jours.
He was in the hospital for three days.
The circumflex also distinguishes a few homographs: dû (past participle of devoir) vs du (partitive article); mûr (ripe) vs mur (wall); sûr (sure) vs sur (on). These distinctions are partly preserved by the 1990 reform — see below.
Cédille (ç)
The cedilla appears only under c, and only before a, o, u. Its job is to keep the c pronounced /s/ when it would otherwise be /k/. The rule of French is:
- c before e or i = /s/ (no cedilla needed): ceci, cinq
- c before a, o, u = /k/ by default; add ç to keep /s/: ça, garçon, reçu
Ça va, François ? J'ai reçu ton message.
How's it going, François? I got your message.
Nous commençons la leçon à neuf heures.
We're starting the lesson at nine.
You will never see ç before e or i — there is no need. The cedilla is also obligatory in certain verb conjugations (any -cer verb in nous form of present tense: nous commençons, nous prononçons). Full treatment on spelling/c-cedilla.
Tréma (ë, ï, ü)
The tréma (also called diaeresis) signals that two vowels are pronounced separately rather than merging into a single sound. Without the tréma, ai, oi, ui would each be a single combined vowel; with the tréma on the second vowel, they break apart.
| Without tréma | With tréma | Difference |
|---|---|---|
| mais /mɛ/ | maïs /ma.is/ | "but" vs "corn" |
| (would merge) | naïve /na.iv/ | two syllables |
| (would merge) | Noël /nɔ.ɛl/ | two syllables |
Joyeux Noël ! On mange du maïs avec la dinde.
Merry Christmas! We're having corn with the turkey.
Elle est naïve, mais très intelligente.
She's naive but very intelligent.
The tréma also appears in proper names (Citroën, Saint-Saëns) and a handful of feminine adjectives (aiguë — sharp, fem.; ambiguë — ambiguous, fem.). After the 1990 reform, the tréma can shift positions in some words (aigüe alongside aiguë).
The apostrophe and elision
French has a structural intolerance for hiatus — two vowels meeting across a word boundary. To prevent it, certain short words (le, la, je, me, te, se, de, ne, que, ce, si) drop their final vowel and attach to the following word with an apostrophe. This is called elision.
J'ai pris l'avion ce matin.
I took the plane this morning.
Je n'ai pas d'argent.
I don't have any money.
C'est l'heure d'aller au lit.
It's time to go to bed.
The rules are mechanical: elision happens before a vowel or a silent h (l'homme, l'heure), but not before an aspirated h (le héros, la haine). This last subtlety is treated on spelling/apostrophe-rules.
Si elides only before il, ils, never before elle, elles — a French oddity worth memorizing:
S'il vient, on partira ensemble.
If he comes, we'll leave together.
Si elle vient, on partira ensemble.
If she comes, we'll leave together. (no elision)
Silent letters: the great divide
This is where French and Spanish (or Italian) part ways. French preserves a thick layer of letters that are written but not pronounced. These silent letters are not decoration — they encode grammatical information (gender, number, person) and etymology.
Final consonants — usually silent
The default rule: a consonant at the end of a French word is silent.
| Written | Pronounced |
|---|---|
| parlent (they speak) | /paʁl/ (silent -ent) |
| gros (big) | /ɡʁo/ (silent -s) |
| vingt (twenty) | /vɛ̃/ (silent -gt) |
| nez (nose) | /ne/ (silent -z) |
| paix (peace) | /pɛ/ (silent -x) |
The mnemonic for exceptions — final consonants that are pronounced — is CaReFuL: c, r, f, l. These four are usually pronounced at the end of a word.
| Letter | Pronounced example |
|---|---|
| c | parc, sac, avec |
| r | cher, hier, partir (in most -ir verbs) |
| f | chef, neuf, œuf |
| l | sel, fil, soleil |
There are exceptions to the exceptions (estomac /ɛstɔma/ — silent final c; aller /ale/ — silent final r in -er verb infinitives), which is why French pronunciation has to be learned word by word. Full treatment on spelling/silent-letters.
Liaison: silent letters waking up
A French final consonant that is silent in isolation can become pronounced when the next word starts with a vowel. This is called liaison.
Les amis arrivent. /lez‿ami z‿aʁiv/
The friends are arriving. (silent -s in 'les' and 'amis' both wake up as /z/ before vowels)
C'est un grand homme. /sɛt‿œ̃ ɡʁɑ̃t‿ɔm/
He's a great man. (silent -t in 'est' and 'grand' both pronounced before vowels)
Liaison is one of the most distinctive features of spoken French and is a major topic on its own (see pronunciation/liaison-obligatory). For the spelling system, the takeaway is: the silent letters are there because they're not silent everywhere — they come alive at word boundaries. The spelling preserves information the pronunciation sometimes needs.
Final -e — silent but functional
A final -e without an accent is silent in standard French (table /tabl/, parle /paʁl/), but it changes everything that comes before it. The presence or absence of a final -e:
- Makes the preceding consonant pronounced: grand /ɡʁɑ̃/ vs grande /ɡʁɑ̃d/.
- Marks feminine adjectives and nouns: petit/petite, grand/grande, étudiant/étudiante.
Un petit garçon. /œ̃ pəti ɡaʁsɔ̃/
A little boy. (silent final -t in 'petit')
Une petite fille. /yn pətit fij/
A little girl. (final -t pronounced because of the -e)
This is why French final -e is the most important silent letter in the language: it does no acoustic work itself but governs the pronunciation of everything to its left.
The 1990 reform: when both spellings are right
In 1990, the Académie française published a series of spelling recommendations intended to regularize a handful of inconsistencies. The reform was never made mandatory; both the traditional and the reformed spellings are now officially correct, and dictionaries record both. Learners will encounter both forms in the wild.
The main changes:
- Circumflex optional on i and u: île/ile, août/aout, connaître/connaitre, paraître/paraitre. The circumflex is kept when it distinguishes meaning: dû, mûr, sûr, jeûne.
- Hyphens removed in many compound words: portemonnaie (alongside porte-monnaie).
- Some accent grave changes: événement → évènement (event), bringing spelling closer to pronunciation.
- Some plurals regularized: des après-midis (alongside the invariable des après-midi).
- A few specific words rewritten: nénufar (alongside nénuphar — water lily), ognon (alongside oignon — onion).
L'île est très belle. / L'ile est très belle.
The island is very beautiful. (traditional / reformed — both correct)
Quel événement ! / Quel évènement !
What an event! (both correct)
In practice, school textbooks (especially in France) increasingly use reformed spellings; many published books still use traditional ones; Quebec has embraced the reform faster than France. For learners: pick a system, be consistent, and don't be confused when you see the other one. Full treatment on spelling/1990-reform.
Source-language comparison
English spelling is famously irregular, with most irregularities coming from preserved older spellings (knight, through, debt). French is much more regular than English — once you know the rules for diacritics and silent letters, you can predict the pronunciation of an unfamiliar written word with high accuracy. The reverse direction (pronunciation → spelling) is harder, because the same sound can be spelled multiple ways (/o/ = o, au, eau, ô).
For English speakers, the surprises are:
- Diacritics are mandatory. They are not "accents you add for flavor." Forgetting them is a misspelling.
- The cedilla is a different letter from c, in the sense that the pronunciation rule absolutely requires it.
- Silent letters carry information — they tell you the gender, the number, the tense — even when you can't hear them.
- Two correct spellings exist for many words, thanks to the 1990 reform.
Common Mistakes
❌ Je vais a Paris ou ma soeur habite.
Incorrect — missing accents on à and où change the meaning; missing tréma/ligature on sœur.
✅ Je vais à Paris où ma sœur habite.
I'm going to Paris where my sister lives.
❌ Nous commencons la lecon a 9h.
Incorrect — missing cedilla on commençons and leçon; missing à.
✅ Nous commençons la leçon à 9h.
We're starting the lesson at 9.
❌ J'ai eté à l'ecole.
Incorrect — été and école both need acute accents.
✅ J'ai été à l'école.
I went to school.
❌ Le maïs ou le mais ?
Two completely different words — maïs (corn, with tréma) vs mais (but). The tréma is not optional.
✅ Mais j'aime le maïs.
But I like corn.
❌ Si il vient, on part.
Incorrect — si must elide before il.
✅ S'il vient, on part.
If he comes, we leave.
Key takeaways
- Five diacritics: é (acute), è/à/ù (grave), â/ê/î/ô/û (circumflex), ç (cedilla), ï/ë/ü (tréma). All are mandatory.
- The circumflex often marks a historical lost s — useful for spotting English cognates (hôpital ~ hospital).
- The cedilla is used only before a, o, u to keep c soft.
- The apostrophe marks elision: short words drop their vowel before vowel-initial words.
- Final consonants are typically silent, except for C-R-F-L (parc, hier, chef, sel).
- Final -e is silent but makes the preceding consonant pronounced and marks feminine forms.
- The 1990 reform made many circumflexes optional and adjusted a few words; both old and new spellings are correct.
- French is much more predictable spelling-to-sound than English; sound-to-spelling is the harder direction.
Now practice French
Reading grammar gets you part of the way. The exercises are where it sticks — free, no signup needed.
Start learning French→Related Topics
- Les Accents DiacritiquesA1 — A tour of the five French diacritics — acute, grave, circumflex, cedilla, tréma — what each one marks (sound, meaning, etymology) and the small set of rules that lets you predict where they go.
- Accent Grave vs Aigu: choisir le bonA2 — How to know whether to write é or è — the syllable-structure rule, the verbs that flip between the two, and the small set of à/ù words where the grave isn't about sound at all.
- Le Ç: cedillaA2 — The c-cedilla rule in full: when it appears, when it never appears, why verbs in -cer need it in some forms but not others, and the small set of high-frequency words where forgetting it changes the pronunciation.
- Règles d'Apostrophe: élisionA1 — How French elision works: the small list of words that drop their final vowel before another vowel, the silent-h that allows it, the aspirated-h that blocks it, and the special case of si — which elides only before il(s).
- Les Lettres MuettesA1 — Silent letters in French: why most final consonants don't speak, the CaReFuL exception, the silent -e that controls everything around it, silent h, and how liaison wakes the sleepers up.
- La Réforme Orthographique de 1990C1 — The 1990 spelling reform: optional circumflex on i and u, simplified compounds, regularized plurals, and a handful of rewritten words — all officially correct alongside their traditional forms.