Indirect Object Pronouns

An indirect object is a person which indirectly receives the action of a verb. In French, the indirect object comes directly after the preposition “à” and in English, by the preposition “to”. What is an indirect object?

Let’s look at an example: Félipe offre des fleurs à Claire. (Félipe gives flowers to Claire.) In this sentence, Claire is the indirect object. The indirect object pronoun that replaces “à Claire” is “lui”: Félipe lui offre des fleurs. (Félipe gives flowers to her.) Image source:

An indirect object pronoun is placed right before the verb of which it is the object. Je donne un cadeau à ma mére. (I am giving a gift to my mother.) Since “ma mére” will receive “un cadeau” that I am giving to her, we will replace “ma mère” with “lui” and place it before the verb “donne”. Je lui donne un cadeau. (I am giving a gift to her.)

Here are the French indirect object pronouns: me (to me) nous (to us) te (to you) vous (to you) lui (to him/to her) leur (to them)

Let’s look at some other examples: Il jète le balon à moi. Il me jète le balon. Vous donnez une réponse aux profs ? Vous leur donnez une réponse? Nous envoyons une carte à vous. Nous vous envoyons une carte. Images source:

Notice that in front of a word that begins with a vowel, me and te become m’ and t’. Tu m’offres des fleurs? (Are you giving me flowers?) Il t’écrit une lettre. (He is writing you a letter.)

When the conjugated verb is negative, we will place “ne” before the object pronoun. For example: Vous donnez une réponse aux profs? Non, nous ne leur donnons pas une réponse. Il envoit une carte à moi ? Non, il ne t’envoit pas une carte.

As we already learned, indirect object pronouns will be placed in front of the verb of which it is the object (as in our previous examples). However, in compound tenses (such as the passé composé), these pronouns will be placed in front of the auxiliary (or helping) verb. For example: Mon père m’a envoyé un cadeau. (My father sent me a gift.) Elle leur a parlé tous les jours. (She spoke to them every day.)

Now that we’ve learned all about indirect object pronouns, let’s keep going to practice what we’ve learned! Check out the practice activities in the next section.