Liaison — the consonant that wakes up

In one line

A silent consonant at the end of a word comes alive before a vowel and attaches to the next word.

The table

The sound it makes, not the letter that is written

Compulsory — always make these

Forbidden — never make these

Optional — it depends on formality

The simple rule: the more formal, the more liaison. In everyday speech, make only the compulsory ones.

English has a small version of this and most speakers have no idea they do it. In non-rhotic English, "car" is /kɑː/ with no r — but "the car is here" brings the r back: /kɑːr ɪz/. A silent consonant, woken by a following vowel. That is a liaison, in English, made automatically. The French system is the same instinct applied across the whole language and codified into rules.

Enchaînement — not a liaison, but it sounds like one

Liaison wakes a silent consonant. Enchaînement moves a consonant that was already being pronounced.

The test is one question: is that consonant pronounced when the word stands alone?

Why it matters to you: enchaînement is compulsory and automatic — you do not need to learn it, it happens by itself. All those compulsory/forbidden/optional tables apply to liaison alone.

And in one place liaison is the only sign of the plural

aime and aiment are both /ɛm/. So in speech, the only thing separating singular from plural is the /z/ of the liaison:

If you do not make that /z/, the listener cannot tell whether it was one person or several.

Exceptions

Examples

Common mistakes

How it differs from elision