How To Talk About The Weather In French

Talking about the weather is one of the best ways to spark up a conversation in French.

It's also something you'll use a LOT when talking with Parisians (since they love to complain about the weather!). 🙂 🌧️

How do you say 'weather' in French?

If you want to say 'weather' in French, there are two words you should know:

1. météo
2. temps

The word météo is feminine, so it's used with feminine articles (e.g. la météo).

Temps is masculine, so it uses the le article.

The difference between météo and temps

In French, both météo and temps refer to the weather, but they have important nuances.

Météo is a more technical term that refers to the science or study of weather, including forecasts. Think of the English word "meteorology".

Temps is the more general and informal term for weather (can also refer to time). This is the term you'll use to ask the average person what the weather is like.

If there's one word you learn in this lesson, focus on temps as you'll use it a lot in conversations.

Asking "how's the weather?" in French

Now that you know the difference between these two words, here's how you ask someone what the weather is like:

Weather vocabulary in French

Now you want to answer a person who asks you the same question. For this, you'll need vocabulary.

Here's a table of all the most common weather types in French.

There are obviously more than this, but these are the most important ones.

Sample dialogues

Here are some important sample sentences to demonstrate asking for and sharing the weather in French.

We usually use faire (il fait, or past tense il faisait) for the weather. For example:

• Il fait mauvais
• Il fait chaud

However, to rain, to snow, to hail, to freeze, thaw and to thunder are verbs in their own right, and are used without faire.

Talking about seasons in French

Discussing meteorology (le meteo) in French

Here are a few more sample sentences to finish up:

• Partager l'amour (share):
• 
•