Conjugations and uses of the verb “devoir” en français.

 Je  Tu  Il/Elle  Nous  Vous  Ils/elles

1. Obligation and necessity Dois-tu étudier ce soir ? Do you have to study tonight? Elles doivent manger They must / need to eat. 2. Probability and supposition Il doit rentrer avant le dîner He should / will probably be back before dinner Nous devons gagner plus cette année We should earn more this year. Elle doit être à l'école She must be at school 3. Expectation and intention Je devais aller avec eux I was supposed to go with them. Il devait le faire, mais il a oublié He was supposed to do it, but he forgot 4. Fatalism and inevitability Il devait perdre un jour He had to / was bound to lose one day Elle ne devait pas l'entendre avant lundi She wasn't to hear it until Monday

Devoir can be translated by should, must, ought to, have to, supposed to - the distinction between necessity and probability is not always clear: Je dois faire la lessive (I should/must/have to do the laundry) Il doit arriver demain (He is supposed to / should / has to arrive tomorrow)  To specify "must" rather than "should," add a word like absolument or vraiment: Je dois absolument partir I really have to go Nous devons vraiment te parler We must speak to you  To specify "should" rather than "must," use the conditional: Tu devrais partir Ils devraient lui parler You should leave. They should talk to him.conditional  To say that something that "should have" happened, use the conditional perfect of devoir plus the infinitive: Tu aurais dû manger You should have eaten. J'aurais dû étudier I should have studied.conditional perfect

 Devoir as a transitive verb When used transitively (and thus not followed by a verb), devoir means "to owe": Combien est-ce qu'il te doit ? How much does he owe you? Pierre me doit 10 francs Pierre owes me 10 francstransitively  Devoir as a noun  Devoir is also a masculine noun. Le devoir means "duty," while les devoirscan mean "duties" or "homework."

 should meaning ought to  Where you could replace should with ought to and it would have more or less the same meaning, then a common translation in French is to use the conditional tense of the verb devoir. As in English, it is followed by the infinitive. For example:conditional tensedevoir  je/tu devrais venir I/you should come il devrait faire ses devoirs he should do his homework on devrait pouvoir venir we should be able to come vous devriez l'aider you should help him  How to translate should have... into French  The formula should have... is translated into French using the conditional perfect of devoir. This means that you use:devoir  conditional of avoir + dû + infinitiveavoir  For example:  j'aurais dû venir I should have come tu aurais dû lui dire que tu étais malade you should have told him that you were ill il n'aurait pas dû manger tant de chocolat he shouldn't have eaten so much chocolate

 should meaning would  In formal, old-fashioned usage, should is sometimes used to mean would.  Where you could change should to would with essentially no change of meaning, then use the conditional tense as usual in French.conditional tense  Since using should in this way is essentially formal (and for many speakers old- fashioned), you could try to find a formal verb in French. For example, for I should like... a possibility is to say j'aimerais... orje souhaiterais... rather than je voudrais.... It's often not possible to make such a distinction in French, however.  should introducing a condition  In English, the construction if I/you should... is sometimes used to mean something similar to if ever I/you.... In French, a possible translation is therefore to use si jamais... ("if ever..."):  si jamais vous visitez la France, allez voir la Tour Eiffel if you should (ever) visit France, go and see the Eiffel Tower

 "it is surprising that he should..." etc  In formal or careful usage, English sometimes uses should to emphasise the speaker's reaction to something rather than stating that something has taken place. (In a formal analysis, this is sometimes called a non-assertion.) For example:  I was really surprised that he should decide to come  In this sentence, the speaker chooses to say should decide rather than decided to emphasise theirreaction to the decision rather than simply stating that the decision was made.  In French, this use of should generally corresponds to the subjunctive. The subjunctive is a special verb form used to make a non-assertion. (English no longer has subjunctive forms of the verb; the nearest equivalent to the subjunctive in English is using other constructions such as should..., might... as in the above example.) So to translate the above example into French using the subjunctive, we might say:subjunctive  cela m'a vraiment étonné qu'il ait décidé de venir  The construction ait décidé means roughly the same as a décidé = (has) decided, but ait is thesubjunctive form of avoir rather than the usual present tense form that you'd use to form the perfect tense.avoir

Present Tensemust, have to probably Je dois étudier. Il doit être malade. I must (have to) study. He's probably sick. Passé Composéhad to (and did), must have Il a dû partir.He had to leave. Imperfectwas supposed to, used to have to Elle devait chanter ce soir.She was supposed to sing tonight. Futurewill have toTu devras payer l'argent.You will have to pay money. ConditionalshouldVous devriez manger les fruits. You should eat fruits. Past Conditionalshould haveIls auraient dû jouer.They should have played.