Demander, Prier, Supplier — Asking with Varying Intensity

When English says I'm asking you to come, the verb ask is doing a tremendous amount of work — covering everything from a friendly invitation to a stern request to a desperate plea. French does not let one verb cover that range. It has at least three distinct verbs for asking someone to do something, arranged on an intensity scale: demander (neutral, the everyday default), prier (formal politeness, often in writing), and supplier (desperate emotional plea). Picking up the scale is part of how French speakers signal social register; getting it wrong instantly marks you as foreign. This page maps the three verbs to their territories, drills the de + infinitif and que + subjonctif patterns, and adds the formal cousins solliciter, réclamer, and interroger for completeness.

The intensity scale

Before diving into syntax, anchor the meaning hierarchy. All three verbs translate roughly as ask, but they sit at different points on a scale of urgency, formality, and emotional weight:

A useful test: if the English equivalent is plead or beg, you want supplier. If it is kindly request or entreat, you want prier. For everything else, you want demander.

Demander — the neutral ask

Demander is the workhorse. It covers asking for an object, asking a question, and asking someone to do something. Three patterns dominate, and each takes a different complement.

demander quelque chose à quelqu'un — ask someone for something

When the thing requested is a noun (a coffee, a favor, the bill), French uses demander qqch à qqn. The thing requested is the direct object, the person asked is the indirect object introduced by à. This pattern is the inverse of the English word order — note that French asks something OF someone, not asks someone FOR something.

The structure feels backwards to English speakers because English uses ask + person + for + thing while French uses demander + thing + à + person. Drill this until it's automatic. The mistake of reversing it (demander quelqu'un pour quelque chose) is one of the most persistent errors in learner French.

demander à quelqu'un de + infinitif — ask someone to do something

When you want someone to do something, the structure is demander à qqn de + infinitif. The person is the indirect object (à), the action is in the infinitive introduced by de.

This is the pattern you'll use most often. Note that the pronoun for the person asked is me, te, lui, nous, vous, leur (indirect-object pronouns), not me, te, le/la, les (direct-object pronouns). This makes a difference for third-person singular and plural: je lui demande de venir (I ask him/her to come), not je le demande de venir.

demander que + subjonctif

A more formal alternative to the infinitive construction uses demander que + subjunctive. The subjunctive is obligatory because demander expresses a desire about someone else's action — a classic subjunctive trigger.

In everyday French, demander à qqn de + infinitif is far more common than demander que + subjonctif — the latter sounds more legalistic. Use que + subj when you want emphasis or formality.

demander si — ask whether

To ask a question (whether something is true), use demander si + indicative. Crucially, the embedded clause uses indicative, not subjunctive — demander si reports a question, it doesn't introduce a desire.

This is a different demander — it's the verb of inquiring rather than requesting. The same verb, two semantic flavors, distinguished by the conjunction (de + inf for requests; si + indic for questions).

Conjugation of demander

Demander is a regular -er verb with no spelling complications:

A famous false friend

Demander does not mean demand in English's strong sense. It is a neutral ask. To demand in English (with force, often confrontationally) is in French exiger (require, insist on) or réclamer (claim back, demand what is owed). Translating I demand a refund as je demande un remboursement sounds polite — almost timid — to a French ear. The forceful equivalent is j'exige un remboursement.

Prier — the polite/formal request

Prier sits a register higher than demander. It is the verb of polite written requests, courteous oral exchanges, and — in a religious sense — prayer.

prier qqn de + infinitif

The standard pattern is prier qqn de + infinitif — note that the person asked is the direct object here (not indirect, as with demander). This is one of the trickiest pieces of syntax to internalize because the verbs are similar in meaning but differ in their case-marking.

This formula — je vous prie de bien vouloir + infinitif — is the workhorse of French formal correspondence. Every business letter, every administrative form, every formal request uses it. Memorize it as a unit. The double politeness (prier + bien vouloir) sounds redundant in English but is standard in French.

Pronoun pattern: direct object

Because prier takes a direct object (not à + person), the pronouns are me, te, le/la, nous, vous, les — not lui or leur.

This is a hard contrast against demander: je lui demande de venir (indirect object) vs je le prie de venir (direct object). Same translation, different case-marking.

Je vous en prie — the high-frequency politeness formula

The fixed expression je vous en prie (literally "I beg you of it") has two main uses, both essential to everyday politeness:

1. As a response to merci: it means you're welcome.
2. As an invitation to proceed: it means please, go ahead / after you.

The tu equivalent is je t'en prie, used in informal contexts. Both forms are essential — they are among the most frequent fixed expressions in French politeness.

Religious sense — pray

Prier also means to pray in the religious sense:

The two senses (kindly request and pray) are related historically — both involve appealing to a higher authority, whether human or divine. In modern French the distinction is clear from context.

Conjugation of prier

Prier is a regular -er verb but the -i in the stem creates a doubled -i in the imparfait and present subjunctive of nous and vous (because the imparfait ending starts with i: priions, priiez).

The doubled -ii- in priions and priiez is correct and required — leaving it as prions, priez would collide with the present-tense forms.

Supplier — the desperate plea

Supplier raises the intensity all the way. Where prier is courtly, supplier is emotional — the verb of begging, imploring, pleading from a position of need. It carries dramatic weight; using it for trivial requests sounds melodramatic.

supplier qqn de + infinitif

Like prier, supplier takes a direct-object person:

The agreement suppliée in the third example reflects the rule that past participles agree with a preceding direct object — here m' is feminine, so supplié takes -e.

Emotional contexts

Supplier belongs in moments of real urgency: pleading for forgiveness, begging for help in a crisis, imploring someone to stay or to stop.

The phrase je t'en supplie is the emotional cousin of je t'en prie — same syntactic shape, but where prie is courteous, supplie is desperate. Je t'en supplie would be wildly out of place as a response to merci; je t'en prie would be wildly understated in a moment of pleading.

Conjugation of supplier

Supplier follows the same pattern as prier — same doubled -ii- in the nous and vous imparfait.

The formal cousins: solliciter, réclamer, interroger

Three more request-related verbs round out the family. All belong to the formal/administrative register.

solliciter — formally request

Solliciter is the verb of formal applications: requesting a meeting, an interview, a position, a response. It is heavily administrative.

réclamer — demand back / claim

Réclamer is the verb of demanding what is owed — claiming a refund, demanding rights, asking insistently for something one feels entitled to. It carries an undertone of I am owed this.

interroger — question (formal)

Interroger is the verb of formal questioning — interviewing a witness, examining a student, querying a database.

Same situation, four registers

To make the scale concrete, take a single situation — please be quiet — and watch the verb shift register:

The right verb depends entirely on the social and emotional weight of the moment. A request in a courtroom is prier; the same request between exhausted parents is supplier; from one friend to another, demander.

Common Mistakes

Mistake 1: Treating demander as demand.

Mistake 2: Reversing the demander word order.

Mistake 3: Using lui with prier or supplier.

Mistake 4: Using subjunctive after demander si.

Mistake 5: Overusing supplier for ordinary requests.

Mistake 6: Saying je vous en supplie as a response to merci.

Key takeaways

The three core verbs sit on an intensity scale: demander (neutral, everyday), prier (formal politeness, often in writing), supplier (desperate emotional plea). Picking the right one is part of how French speakers signal social register.

Two syntactic facts to lock in: demander takes the person as indirect object (demander à qqn de + inf), while prier and supplier take the person as direct object (prier qqn de + inf, supplier qqn de + inf). This means the pronouns differ: je lui demande but je le prie / je le supplie.

The fixed expression je vous en prie is among the most frequent politeness formulas in French — it works as both you're welcome and please, go ahead. The desperate cousin je t'en supplie belongs to moments of real plea. Memorize the pair as a unit.

Beware the false-friend trap: demander is a neutral ask, not a demand. The angry English demand is exiger; the persistent demand back is réclamer; the formal administrative request is solliciter. French slices this part of the lexicon thinner than English, and precision pays off.