French prepositions

Posted by Josh on 27th May 2026 in the blog in the learning french category

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What is a preposition?

A preposition is a word we use to show the relationship between a noun or pronoun and the rest of the sentence. Prepositions are indispensable for talking about time, causation and place, as well as other types of relationship.

There are quite a number of prepositions in French, and most of them are used in specific contexts, which we've outlined below. For each word we've provided a translation, but it's worth bearing in mind that some prepositions are more specific than their English translations (while 'around' in English can mean both 'roughly' and 'surrounding', in French this would be translated as environ or autour de respectively). The prepositions below are some of the most common words used in French, and the more you encounter them, the more familiar you’ll become with their usage.

The following list is extensive, and some of these prepositions are more common than others. If you're just getting started with prepositions, we recommend checking out Lesson 09 of The Complete French Course.

Common prepositions

French	English
à	to, at, in
après	after
avant	before
avec	with
chez	at the home/office of
contre	against
dans	in, inside
de	from, of, about
depuis	since, for
derrière	behind
devant	in front of
durant	during, while
en	in, to
entre	between
envers	towards
environ	approximately, around
malgré	despite
par	by, through
parmi	among
pendant	during
pour	for
sans	without
sauf	except
selon	according to
sous	under
suivant	according to/following
sur	on
vers	towards, near

Spatial/positional prepositions

French	English
à coté de	next to
à travers	through/across
au coin de	at the corner of
au-delà de	beyond
au-dessus de	above
auprès de	next to/with
autour de	around
en-dessous de	below
en face de	opposite
hors de	outside of
loin de	far from
près de	near

Temporal prepositions

French	English
après	after
avant	before
depuis	since, for
jusqu’à	up to, until
pendant	for, during

Prepositional phrases

French	English
à cause de	because of
grâce à	thanks to
face à	facing
au lieu de	instead of
par rapport à	compared to/in relation to
quant à	as for
vis-à-vis de	regarding/with respect to

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