One can be certain about events in the distant future too.įor example, look at the following sentences in French and in English and try to imagine the different contexts in which they would be appropriate. Of course, speakers are usually more certain about the immediate future and less certain about the distant future.ĭoes this mean that certainty and distance to the present always go together? Not exactly. In this case, the tense indicates both the immediacy of the future event as well as its inevitability in the mind of the speaker. Why?īecause when someone loses his balance, he will invariably fall. In this scenario, first sentence, the one in the near future, sounds more plausible in French and in English. A horrified onlooker sees the man beginning to teeter and screams: Suppose that a very disturbed man has just climbed out onto the ledge of a skyscraper. Let's imagine a context to make this distinction more clear. In contrast, the futur simple indicates that the speaker is less certain of the future event coming to pass. The futur proche indicates that the speaker is relatively certain that the future event will actually happen. The two tenses also indicate a difference in the speaker's perception of the future event.

The futur simple, on the other hand, is often used for events in the more distant future.īecause the futur simple is associated with distant future events, it often takes on a detached, objective quality making it the preferred tense for future events that represent general truths. The future proche, also called the futur immédiat, typically refers to a time very close to the present moment, i.e, the near or immediate future. Thus, the futur proche is primarily used in speech and less frequently in writing.Īccording to traditional grammars, the two tenses also differ in their relative distance to the present moment. The future proche is used in more informal contexts and the simple future in more formal contexts. So what is the difference? In general, the two tenses differ in their level of formality The two tenses are virtually interachangeable in most contexts, especially in spoken French.

'I will leave').įor more details on the formation of these two future tenses, including irregular forms, see the related links:įuture: regular, future: irregular, and futur proche. Instead, the infinitive form becomes the stem to which future endings are added ( Je partirai. The futur simple doesn't have an auxiliary. The futur proche is formed with the auxiliary aller which is followed by an infinitive ( Je vais partir. French has two future tenses - the futur proche and the futur simple.

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