Techniques to Improve Your French
11 French-Only Sites That You Can Use to Help Your French
Jun
When learning French online most people choose to learn from websites whose sole purpose is to help you learn French. There’s typically no problem with this when you’re first starting out, but at some point it’s nice to move on to something further. It’s for this reason that I put together a list of some of my favorite websites that were created for native-French speakers to enjoy, but that you can use to help improve your French as well. There are no doubt many other websites that aren’t found on this list, but the ones below are some of my favorites and ones that I personally use frequently.
The site viedemerde.fr was created in 2008. Most people are more familiar with the English version known as “F My Life”. In case you aren’t familiar with how either of these sites work let me explain. Vie de merde allows you to anonymously post about an experience that occurred in your daily life. People can then visit the site and vote on your story. An upvote means that they sympathize with you and agree that you have had a bad experience, whereas a downvote indicates that you deserve whatever happened to you. The more votes your story gets the higher it rises up on the page. The good thing about this site is that each story is only a few sentences long which makes it easier to digest it all. Another good thing about this site is that each story is moderated for quality assurance so you don’t have to worry about encountering a lot of grammar or spelling mistakes. This site is so popular that in June 2013 it was one of France’s top 500 most visited websites. I highly recommend you check it out and read all the funny (or not) stories that you can find.
People often say to stay away from these sorts of sites, but this is a situation where you should ignore this advice. Doctissimo.fr is a website where you can get medical advice on a variety of different topics. Think of it like a French version of Web MD. In my experience this site is probably the best resource for medical-related vocabulary seeing as it covers pretty much every possibly medical problem out there. There’s even a forum where people explain their maladies to others and receive responses. Because of this, you can learn all sorts of vocabulary and phrases to describe all sorts of ailments. Although you should always take medical advice you find online with a grain of salt, you can find a way to talk about virtually anything wrong with you on here. From headaches to vaccinations, Doctissimo.fr is my number one recommended website to learn medical-related words and phrases.
Yes, I know what you’re thinking, this isn’t a French site. This page on Reddit however is entirely in French and most of its visitors are native-French speakers. Reddit.com/r/france talks about variety of interesting subjects from politics and business to humor and culture. One good thing about this page is that it is quite active meaning every time you visit it there should be brand-new material that you can read about. If you feel up to it you can even comment and join in on the discussion but for those who would rather sit back in observed passively you can totally do that as well. Unlike some of the sites listed in this article it’s a little more advanced, so if you’re still in the beginner/intermediate stages of your learning perhaps you should visit this one at a later time.
This website is an extremely popular French infotainment website is all over Facebook and other social media platforms. Very much like a French Buzzfeed, they contain articles on topics from current events, politics, movies and even travel. You know their articles are good because they are constantly going viral. At the time of this writing the site gets about 35 million monthly visitors making it one of the biggest French infotainment websites on the net. Similar to the previous website mentioned (reddit.com/r/france) Demotivateur.fr is constantly being updated so no matter how often you check it out you can always find something new to read.
This website is a very simple site and really only serves one purpose. That purpose is to give you a random verified fact every time you refresh the page. Much like Viedemerde.fr what I like about this website is that it gives you just small paragraph to digest which can help everything to be less overwhelming. They even have an app for your phone that you can download and get your random facts from there which allows you to easily study anywhere. As the title of this website may suggest, using this website frequently won’t make you a better person, but it can give you a small paragraph or group of sentences that you can use to improve your French. Because the facts are verified you know that they’re both true in many cases interesting. Seeing as you may want to use these when speaking with friends it gives you a good incentive to memorize them. Not the most useful site in the world but a little gem in my opinion.
This next website, although enjoyable, is primarily for those who enjoy video games. Nesblog.com contains all sorts of video game related content including commentary and reviews. You can find here some sort of content on virtually any genre of video games so if you’re at all interested in gaming there’s something for you here. There are even links to several video game-related YouTubers who of course create all sorts of funny and amusing videos. The only real downside to this website is that it’s not as updated as it used to be. Fortunately for us however there’re still huge archive of content that you can go searching through. This one isn’t for everyone but if you do enjoy video games and video game culture then you’ll find this site useful.
This is another rather simple site that can be hilarious. Danstonchat.com is made up of online chat conversations that people have had with their friends. If you find that you have had a funny Conversation with a friend online you can post to here for others to see. People can then upvote your short conversations if they find it funny or downvote if they don’t. This is definitely a good site for those who are looking to get introduced to informal speech. Contrary to what you might think most things here are spelled correctly and contain a well formed sentences. Overall an interesting site to visit.
This next site is only recommended for very advanced French speakers. I cannot stress this enough. Prise2tete.fr’s goal is to provide an open forum where anyone can post and respond to various puzzles and enigmas. You can find everything from standard riddles to complicated math equations. Some puzzles can be answered through simple logic and deduction whereas others have no correct answer and just require you to come up with a solution that you think would best fit. For those who are ambitious there’s even a “Hall of Fame” section for those who solve the most enigmas/puzzles. Although I truly enjoy this website, I really wouldn’t recommend it to those who don’t have an extremely strong grasp of the French language.
This site is home to a huge library of everyday questions the people are curious about. They typically revolve around curiosities that want to counters everyday life. While exploring the site when I came across questions such as “why aren’t there snakes in Ireland?” or, “why is wasabi spicy?” The questions are interesting enough to where you could easily spend a lot of time on the site finding answers to questions probably have had yourself at one point. While I was on the site I came across tons of questions that I had never asked myself before but was soon dying to know the answer.
This site is very similar to Nesblog.com, however instead of just speaking about video games you can find all sorts of contents on films, TV series, and even tech product reviews. Unlike Nesblog, this site is updated very frequently and even has the added bonus of cool and interesting articles on a variety of topics, my favorite of which was a whole section on how to create a geek-related stuff. I still wouldn’t say that the site is for everyone, but its subject matter is a little open to more people than Nesblog (even though Nesblog is still superior when it comes to video game).
One of the most popular forms of content on the web is “top list” where people write articles on the “best of” something (such as the top 10 best ways to lose weight). This website is another very popular French infotainment site that creates all sorts of top lists on a variety of subjects from politics to the every day quirks of life. There are even quizzes you can take on an assortment of random and silly subjects. Unfortunately, like Nesblog some portions of the website aren’t updated frequently so a lot of things you’re find here are a few years old. Nevertheless you can still find new articles to read and of course you you have the entire sites archives to explore.
Travel and Language Directory – Worldwide Travel sites and Language resources. Hotel, airline, tourism bureaus, State Tourism offices, Language Schools, Dictionaries and more.
Some of the best things you can do to better your French is to use resources meant just for native speakers. Not only does it give you a sense of motivation, it can help you get real-life exposure that normally would only be available to those who spend time in a French-speaking country. Do you know of other French websites that are listed here? Comment below and tell us about them and how they can help others with their French. Thanks for reading and until next time!
