All verbs

/falwaʁ/to be necessaryB1

Family
Fully irregular — a law unto itself
Takes
impersonal — Impersonal — il is the only subject it ever has

Build map — what to memorise

These three pieces are learnt; every other tense is built from them.

Infinitive
falloir
Near futurefutur-prochefollows the rule

aller + infinitive

falloir

Conjugation

passé-composé
he/sheil a fallu/il a faly/it was necessary
theyils ont fallu/ilz ɔ̃ faly/

Examples

  • Il faut partir.

    /il fo paʁ.tiʁ/

    We have to go.

  • Il faut étudier le français.

    /il fo.t‿e.ty.dje lə fʁɑ̃.sɛ/

    You have to study French.

  • Il ne faut pas.

    /il nə fo pa/

    You mustn't.

Notes

  • It has no other person. There is no je faux; the subject is always the dummy il, and who has to do it comes from context or from il faut que + subjunctive: Il faut que tu partes.

  • Il ne faut pas is a prohibition, not an absence of need. Il ne faut pas fumer means you must not smoke. For "you don't have to", say Ce n'est pas obligatoire. See devoir-falloir.

  • Il faut is far commoner than devoir for general obligation — French prefers the impersonal where English says "you have to".