Free A1 French course: elementary

A1 turns words into conversations: regular verbs in the present, questions, the near future and everyday situations like ordering food, shopping and asking the way.

39 grammar lessons, 6 graded stories, flashcards, audio lessons and an AI conversation partner, all free during the beta. Plan on about 80 hours of study for this level (80 in total from zero).

What you'll be able to do

• Listening: I can understand slow, clear questions about myself, my family and where I live.
• Listening: I can catch numbers, prices and times when people speak slowly.
• Reading: I can read short, simple messages, menus and notices.
• Reading: I can follow a very simple story with pictures or familiar words.
• Speaking: I can order food, buy things and ask for directions with simple phrases.
• Speaking: I can talk about my day, my family and what I like, in short sentences.
• Writing: I can write a short postcard or a simple text message.
• Writing: I can fill in forms with personal details.

What you'll learn

Learning A1 French with AI

At A1 you can role-play a café, a shop or a hotel with the AI partner at your level, and ask it to explain any mistake in plain English. The AI also explains any wrong answer in a lesson, in plain English. It's included free, with a generous daily allowance; like any AI it can make mistakes, so the lessons remain the reference. More about learning French with AI.

All 39 A1 grammar lessons

Free to read here. In the app, each one is taught in short steps with audio, practised, and brought back for review.

1. Regular -er verbs
2. Regular -ir verbs
3. Regular -re verbs
4. Semi-regular -cer and -ger verbs
5. -eler and -eter verbs
6. Venir, tenir
7. Pouvoir, vouloir, devoir
8. Prendre
9. Reflexive verbs
10. Near future
11. Recent past
12. Present tense usage
13. Negation
14. Negation
15. Indefinite articles after negation
16. Partitive articles
17. Contracted articles
18. Possessive adjectives
19. Possessive adjectives
20. Demonstrative adjectives
21. Adjectives before the noun (BAGS)
22. Irregular adjectives
23. Adjectives
24. Stress pronouns
25. Subject pronoun
26. C'est vs il est / elle est
27. Yes / no questions
28. Question words
29. Quel, quelle, quels, quelles
30. Prepositions with countries
31. Chez
32. Pour + infinitive = in order to
33. Numbers 21–100
34. Telling time
35. Days, months and dates
36. Ordinal numbers
37. Il fait…
38. Avoir besoin de, avoir envie de, avoir peur de
39. Jouer à vs jouer de

Reading at A1

• Une journée normale: Léa's ordinary weekday, from the alarm to bedtime.
• Le marché du samedi: Shopping for fruit, cheese and bread at the Saturday market.
• Le nouveau voisin: A new neighbour moves in. He is polite, quiet… and he goes out every night with a red suitcase.
• Au téléphone: Two friends make plans for the weekend.
• La valise rouge: Léa follows Monsieur Bernard into the night.
• Les vacances de Karim: Karim plans a summer holiday in the south of France.

Questions