Use vous with anyone you don’t know, anyone older or senior to you, and anyone serving you: shop staff, waiters, hotel receptionists, officials. Use tu with friends, family, children, pets and people your age in casual settings. Vous is also the only way to say “you” to more than one person. When in doubt, start with vous.
English dropped its informal “thou” centuries ago, so one word, “you,” covers your boss, your dog and a room full of strangers. English signals distance with other tools: first name or last name, “Hey” or “Good morning,” slang or no slang. French does all of that too, but it also builds the choice into the pronoun, the verb ending, the possessives and the imperative. You cannot say a single sentence to someone without choosing.
The second surprise is that vous does double duty. It is the polite singular, and it is the plural for everyone. When you ask two close friends Vous venez ce soir ?, you are not being formal; there is simply no plural tu. Plenty of learners say Tu venez or use tu while looking at a group. Neither works.
| Who you are talking to | Default | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Waiter, baker, cashier, pharmacist | vous | Always, even if they are younger than you. |
| A stranger you ask for directions | vous | Excusez-moi, vous savez où est la gare ? |
| Hotel or train station staff | vous | Same for police, doctors and anyone at a government office. |
| Your manager | vous | Until they suggest tu. Some workplaces use tu from the first day. |
| Coworkers at your level | it depends | Listen to what colleagues use with each other and copy it. |
| Your partner’s parents | vous | Until they invite you to switch, which they usually will. |
| A friend of a friend, around your age, at a party | tu | Among younger adults in social settings, tu is normal right away. |
| Children | tu | Vous with a child sounds stiff and strange. |
| Family, close friends, pets | tu | Yes, people say tu to their cat. |
| Any group of two or more | vous | Formal or not, plural is always vous. |
Region matters too. In Quebec, tu is used more widely in everyday exchanges than in France, including with people you have just met. If you learned French in France and visit Montreal, expect to be addressed as tu more often. In France, using tu with an adult stranger in a shop still reads as overly familiar at best.
Choosing tu or vous sets off a chain of other forms. The classic beginner mistake is to start in one register and drift into the other halfway through the sentence.
| Form | Tu | Vous |
|---|---|---|
| Verb (être) | tu es | vous êtes |
| Verb (avoir) | tu as | vous avez |
| Verb (pouvoir) | tu peux | vous pouvez |
| Object pronoun | Je te remercie. | Je vous remercie. |
| Possessive | ton sac, ta valise, tes clés | votre sac, votre valise, vos clés |
| Imperative | Excuse-moi. Attends. | Excusez-moi. Attendez. |
| Please | s’il te plaît | s’il vous plaît |
| Stressed pronoun | Et toi ? | Et vous ? |
Watch the small words. A traveler says Bonjour, vous avez une chambre ? to a receptionist and then, on autopilot, Merci, et toi ? when asked how they are. Or they open with Excusez-moi and then ask est-ce que tu as un plan ? Consistency matters more than the choice itself.
Formal vous also affects adjectives and participles, which follow the real person, not the plural verb. To one man: Vous êtes très gentil. To one woman: Vous êtes prête ? To a group: Vous êtes prêts ? English speakers who learn that vous takes a plural verb often add a plural s to every adjective. Only add it when you are talking to more than one person.
French has verbs for the choice itself: tutoyer, to address someone as tu, and vouvoyer, to address someone as vous. They make the switch easy to negotiate out loud.
The older or more senior person usually makes the offer, so as a newcomer you can simply wait. Once two people have switched to tu, going back to vous is rare and reads as a deliberate cooling of the relationship. If a French speaker your age uses tu with you at a party or online, answer with tu; holding on to vous would sound distant.
First names do not settle the question the way they would in English. In many French offices, colleagues say Marie, vous avez le dossier ? using a first name and vous together. On the other hand, Monsieur and Madame always go with vous: Bonjour Madame, vous désirez ?
The choice only becomes automatic when you hear yourself make it in real exchanges: vous with the baker, tu with a new friend, vous again with the hotel clerk. Rehearsing those switches out loud, back to back, trains the verb endings along with the pronoun.
With an adult stranger in a shop, on the street or at a hotel desk, yes, it usually sounds overly familiar. Among young people at a bar, a festival or online, tu is normal from the start.
Start with vous and let them invite you to switch. Most families will suggest tu fairly soon, often with Tu peux me tutoyer. Some traditional families keep vous longer, and that is not a sign of coldness.
Yes, whenever you talk to two or more of them at once. Vous is the only plural form of you, so Vous venez ce soir ? to a group of friends is perfectly casual.
Usually that they want distance, after a conflict for example. In a formal setting such as a meeting with clients, some colleagues also return to vous temporarily for appearances, then go back to tu afterward.
