Memorize French Idioms and False Friends: 197 Flashcards, Checked Card by Card
Learn French idioms like poser un lapin and false friends like librairie, éventuellement and sensible with 197 flashcards, plus which cards to fix first.
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French rewards learners twice here: its idioms are vivid (poser un lapin, to "put down a rabbit", means to stand someone up) and its false friends are traps you will fall into in your first week. The Flip It deck French Idioms, Expressions & False Friends (deck code EL1988, 197 cards) covers both, in two blocks: English idiom → French equivalent (cards 1-98), then French false friend → real meaning (99-197).
Study this deck: French Idioms, Expressions & False Friends
1 / 10to cost an arm and a leg
Tap the card for the answer · swipe right if you knew it, left if not
Sample cards
| Front | Back |
|---|---|
| to cost an arm and a leg | coûter les yeux de la tête |
| to have other fish to fry | avoir d'autres chats à fouetter |
| once in a blue moon | tous les trente-six du mois |
| to stand someone up | poser un lapin |
| when pigs fly | quand les poules auront des dents |
| French: éventuellement | possibly, perhaps (NOT eventually) |
| French: librairie | bookstore (NOT library = bibliothèque) |
| French: location | rental (NOT location = endroit, lieu) |
| French: sensible | sensitive (NOT sensible = raisonnable) |
Idioms you'll learn: vendre la mèche, tourner autour du pot, jeter l'éponge, avoir un chat dans la gorge, se lever du pied gauche, mettre les pieds dans le plat, ne pas être dans son assiette, casser sa pipe, avoir le cafard, avoir du pain sur la planche, se la couler douce, avoir une araignée au plafond, manger les pissenlits par la racine.
False friends you'll master: actuellement, assister, attendre, blesser, car, coin, déception, demander, éditeur, évidence, ignorer, journal, monnaie, pétrole, phrase, prévenir, quitter, rester, stage, sympathique, veste, collège, caution, commander, conducteur, envie.
Fix these before you drill
Some French backs are calques, not idioms. Avoir la dent sucrée is Québec French (in France: être bec sucré), pleurer sur le lait renversé and il faut être deux pour danser le tango are translations a French speaker would recognise but rarely use, and faire une montagne d'une taupinière is usually faire une montagne de rien. A few glosses miss: cassant (card 71) means curt, not a pain in the neck (keep casse-pieds), and mettre les points sur les i (76) is closer to spell it out than put one's foot down (taper du poing sur la table).
Merge the duplicates. Être sur la même longueur d'onde answers both 45 and 93, être aux anges both 66 and 78, vendre la mèche both 12 and 63, perdre la boule 28 and 90. Keep one card each and add the second English front as a hint.
Tag the safe cognates and the phantom pairs. About ten false-friend cards admit the words mean the same thing (comprendre, parking, viande, branche, ballon, confort, argument): tag them safe so you stop doubting real cognates. Others oppose words nobody confuses (genoux/genius, salé/salad, vieux/vicious), and constipé is a Spanish trap (constipado = having a cold), not a French one. Card 115 contradicts itself: disposition does not mean temperament in French, but English disposition does.
A study order that works
Learn the false friends first: they cause real misunderstandings (je suis excité, or préservatif when you mean preservative) and each card holds two words. Say the French word, the true meaning, and the French translation of the English look-alike (librairie = bookstore; library = bibliothèque). Then do the idioms in themed batches: weather, animals, money, sleep. Note that the list runs alphabetically to villa (171) and restarts at agrément, so shuffle the deck.
Same format, other languages: German idioms and false friends and Portuguese idioms and false friends.
Find deck EL1988 in the library at flip-it.app.
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