French guides · Verb tables + audio
Parler: the model verb — and four silent endings.
Parler means “to speak”, and it is the single most valuable conjugation table in French. Roughly nine verbs in ten end in -er and follow this pattern exactly, with no stem changes and no surprises. Learn these six endings and you can conjugate hundreds of verbs you have never met. The catch is not the spelling — it is that four of the six forms sound the same.
Présent — the six endings that cover everything
The stem parl- never moves. Only the ending changes: -e, -es, -e, -ons, -ez, -ent. Take any -er verb, chop the -er, and hang these on the end.
| French | English | Listen |
|---|---|---|
| je parle | I speak | |
| tu parles | you speak | |
| il / elle parle | he / she speaks | |
| nous parlons | we speak | |
| vous parlez | you speak | |
| ils / elles parlent | they speak |
Je parle, tu parles, il parle and ils parlent are pronounced identically — “parl”. The -e, -es and -ent endings are all silent. This is not sloppiness; it is the rule. What tells a listener who is speaking is the pronoun in front, which is why French cannot drop its subject pronouns the way Spanish and Italian can.
Nous parlons (“par-LOHN”) and vous parlez (“par-LAY”) are the only forms with an audible ending. Those two endings are consistent across almost every verb in the language, regular or not — a rare piece of good news.
Parler à or parler de?
The conjugation is easy; the prepositions are where people actually go wrong. Parler takes different ones depending on whether you mean the person or the topic.
| French | Means | |
|---|---|---|
| je parle à Marie | I’m talking to Marie | the person takes à |
| je parle de Marie | I’m talking about Marie | the topic takes de |
| je lui parle | I’m talking to him / her | à → lui, never le |
| je parle français | I speak French | no article, no preposition |
| je parle le français | I speak French | also correct, slightly more formal |
Je parle français is the everyday form. Add le and it is still correct but sounds more deliberate. What you cannot do is capitalise it — French writes languages and nationalities in lower case: le français, l’anglais.
Passé composé — the -é participle
Every regular -er verb forms its participle the same way: swap -er for -é. Parler → parlé. It sounds exactly like the infinitive, which is why the two get confused in writing.
| French | English | Listen |
|---|---|---|
| j’ai parlé | I spoke / have spoken | |
| tu as parlé | you spoke / have spoken | |
| il / elle a parlé | he / she spoke / have spoken | |
| nous avons parlé | we spoke / have spoken | |
| vous avez parlé | you spoke / have spoken | |
| ils / elles ont parlé | they spoke / have spoken |
All three are pronounced the same. The test: after a helper verb it is the participle (j’ai parlé); after another conjugated verb or a preposition it is the infinitive (je veux parler); with vous it is -ez. This is the single most common spelling mistake in written French, and native speakers make it constantly.
Imparfait — the endings that never change
Take the nous form (parlons), drop -ons, add -ais, -ais, -ait, -ions, -iez, -aient. Those endings are the same for **every verb in French** — there is exactly one exception in the whole language, and it is être.
| French | English | Listen |
|---|---|---|
| je parlais | I used to speak / was speaking | |
| tu parlais | you used to speak / was speaking | |
| il / elle parlait | he / she used to speak / was speaking | |
| nous parlions | we used to speak / was speaking | |
| vous parliez | you used to speak / was speaking | |
| ils / elles parlaient | they used to speak / was speaking |
Futur and conditionnel — the whole infinitive
For -er verbs the futur stem is simply the infinitive, unchanged: parler + -ai = je parlerai. Nothing is dropped and nothing is added.
| French | English | Listen |
|---|---|---|
| je parlerai | I will speak | |
| tu parleras | you will speak | |
| il / elle parlera | he / she will speak | |
| nous parlerons | we will speak | |
| vous parlerez | you will speak | |
| ils / elles parleront | they will speak |
Conditionnel — would speak
Same stem, imparfait endings: je parlerais. The e before the r is barely pronounced in speech, so je parlerais comes out close to “parl-RAY”.
| French | English | Listen |
|---|---|---|
| je parlerais | I would speak | |
| tu parlerais | you would speak | |
| il / elle parlerait | he / she would speak | |
| nous parlerions | we would speak | |
| vous parleriez | you would speak | |
| ils / elles parleraient | they would speak |
Subjonctif — almost identical to the présent
For regular -er verbs the subjunctive is spelled exactly like the présent in four of six forms. Only nous and vous differ, and they borrow the imparfait’s. In practice this means the subjunctive of most French verbs costs you nothing to learn.
| French | English | Listen |
|---|---|---|
| je parle | (that) I speak | |
| tu parles | (that) you speak | |
| il / elle parle | (that) he / she speak | |
| nous parlions | (that) we speak | |
| vous parliez | (that) you speak | |
| ils / elles parlent | (that) they speak |
Impératif — and the missing s
The tu imperative of an -er verb drops its s: parle !, not parles. Compare finis ! and vends !, which keep theirs. It comes back before y and en for pronunciation: parles-en.
| French | English | Listen |
|---|---|---|
| parle ! | speak! (to one person you know) | |
| parlons ! | let’s speak! | |
| parlez ! | speak! (formal, or to a group) |
Plus-que-parfait — had spoken
J’avais parlé — the imparfait of the helper plus the same -é participle.
| French | English | Listen |
|---|---|---|
| j’avais parlé | I had spoken | |
| tu avais parlé | you had spoken | |
| il / elle avait parlé | he / she had spoken | |
| nous avions parlé | we had spoken | |
| vous aviez parlé | you had spoken | |
| ils / elles avaient parlé | they had spoken |
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Quick answers
Parler, answered.
The questions that come up while you are learning the table.