French Indefinite Adjectives: chaque, plusieurs, même, autre, tout, quelque

A small family of French adjectives sits in front of a noun to talk about quantity or sameness in a general way, without pointing at a specific, already-identified thing. They are indefinite adjectives, and six of them turn up constantly on the AQA GCSE French specification: chaque, plusieurs, même(s), autre(s), tout/toute/tous/toutes, and quelque(s).

The set at a glance

chaque: each, every - always singular

Chaque means "each" or "every", taken one at a time, and it never has a plural form, because the idea of "one at a time" is inherently singular even when it describes a whole set:

• Chaque enfant a un cahier différent. (Each child has a different exercise book.)
• Chaque jour, je me lève à sept heures. (Every day, I get up at seven.)
• Il faut vérifier chaque question. (You have to check each question.)

There is no "chaques", ever - if you need to talk about the group together rather than member by member, reach for tous les instead (below).

plusieurs: several - always plural, never agrees

Plusieurs means "several" and is fixed in its one plural form: it never adds or drops a feminine -e, and it never appears in the singular, since "several" always implies more than one:

• J'ai plusieurs amis dans cette ville. (I have several friends in this city.)
• Elle a plusieurs idées pour le projet. (She has several ideas for the project.)
• Plusieurs personnes attendaient devant la porte. (Several people were waiting at the door.)

même(s): same - and its second job, -self

Même means "same" in front of a noun, and it does agree for number (add s for a plural noun) but never for gender:

• Nous avons la même idée. (We have the same idea.)
• Ils portent les mêmes vêtements. (They're wearing the same clothes.)

Même has a second, unrelated job worth knowing at the same time: placed after a noun or a stressed pronoun, it means "-self" or emphasises "even":

• Le président lui-même est venu. (The president himself came.)
• Même les enfants comprennent. (Even the children understand.) - here même sits before the noun again, but now means "even", not "same". Context, and whether an article follows, tells the two uses apart.

One fixed phrase built on même is worth learning outright: quand même (all the same, even so, anyway) - J'ai quand même essayé. (I tried anyway.) It has drifted far enough from "same" that it is best learned as its own unit rather than reasoned out each time.

autre(s): other

Autre behaves like an ordinary adjective ending in -e for agreement purposes - it just adds -s for the plural and never changes for gender, since it already ends in a gender-neutral -e:

• Je préfère un autre chemin. (I prefer another route.)
• Il veut une autre occasion. (He wants another opportunity.)
• Les autres élèves sont partis. (The other pupils have left.)

Un autre / une autre translates "another"; l'autre / les autres translates "the other(s)" - the article changes the meaning from "one more" to "the remaining one(s)".

tout, toute, tous, toutes: the trickiest of the set

Tout is the one member of this family that behaves like a full adjective with four distinct forms, and it carries its own position rule: it sits in front of the article, not after it, unlike every other adjective in French.

• Tout le monde connaît cette histoire. (Everyone knows this story.) - a fixed phrase, always singular even though it means "everyone".
• Il travaille tout le week-end. (He works the whole weekend.)
• Elle a mangé toute la pizza. (She ate the whole pizza.)
• Tous les jours, je vais au travail à pied. (Every day, I walk to work.)
• Toutes les filles sont prêtes. (All the girls are ready.)

Two fixed phrases are worth learning outright because they turn up constantly in speaking exams: tout le monde (everyone, literally "all the world") and tous les deux (both, literally "all the two").

quelque(s): some, a few

Quelque means "some" or "a few", and in ordinary use it appears almost exclusively in its plural form quelques, since "a few" is rarely a singular idea:

• J'ai quelques questions à te poser. (I have a few questions to ask you.)
• Il reste quelques jours avant les vacances. (There are a few days left before the holidays.)
• Elle a passé quelques années à Paris. (She spent a few years in Paris.)

The singular quelque does exist in more formal or literary French (en quelque sorte, "in a way"), but at GCSE level quelques is what you will meet and need almost every time.

Do not confuse quelques (some, a few, an indefinite adjective in front of a plural noun) with quelque chose (something) - the second is a fixed pronoun phrase, always singular in form, and it has nothing to do with counting: J'ai quelque chose à te dire. (I have something to tell you.) versus J'ai quelques choses à te dire. (I have a few things to tell you.) - genuinely different meanings, one item versus several, hiding behind a one-letter spelling difference.

A note on tout the adverb

Everything above covers tout as an adjective, agreeing with the noun it introduces. French also has an unrelated adverbial tout, meaning "completely" or "very", which does not agree the same way and sits in front of an adjective rather than a noun: elle est tout étonnée (she is quite astonished). That adverbial use is a separate structure from the indefinite adjective covered here - if you see tout directly in front of an adjective rather than a noun, you are looking at the adverb, not this page's tout.

Worked examples across the set

• Chaque matin, plusieurs personnes attendent le même bus. (Each morning, several people wait for the same bus.) - chaque, plusieurs and même in one sentence.
• Tous les élèves ont lu quelques pages du livre. (All the pupils have read a few pages of the book.) - tous les with quelques.
• Il a essayé une autre méthode, mais toutes les autres ont aussi échoué. (He tried another method, but all the others also failed.) - autre and its plural, feeding into toutes.
• Tout le monde a la même idée, mais chaque personne l'exprime différemment. (Everyone has the same idea, but each person expresses it differently.) - tout le monde, même and chaque side by side, showing how the "everyone / same / individual" ideas interact in a single thought.

What to do this week

1. Drill the two words that never change shape - chaque (never plural) and plusieurs (never singular, never feminine) - until reaching for the wrong form feels obviously wrong.
2. Learn the four forms of tout as a single chant: tout, toute, tous, toutes - masculine singular, feminine singular, masculine plural, feminine plural - the same order as any other adjective table you have met.
3. Practise tous les jours and tout le monde as fixed phrases rather than building them fresh each time, since both are exam-frequent and both have a fossilised word order worth memorising outright.
4. Say quelque chose and quelques choses side by side until the one-letter difference in meaning (something versus a few things) stops feeling arbitrary.

GCSE spec note

All six of these indefinite adjectives sit on the AQA GCSE French specification at Foundation and Higher tier. Tout in its four forms is the one examiners test most carefully, because it is also the one most English speakers get wrong by leaving it in the masculine singular regardless of what follows.

Common mistakes English speakers make

Writing "chaques" or "plusieur". Neither word ever changes the way its ending suggests it might - chaque has no plural, plusieurs has no singular and no separate feminine form.

Leaving tout unchanged before a feminine or plural noun. "Tout les filles" and "tout la classe" are both wrong; the forms are toutes les filles and toute la classe.

Putting tout after the article instead of before it. English says "all the days"; French puts tout first: tous les jours, never "les tous jours".

Confusing même before a noun with même after one. La même réponse (the same answer) and le président lui-même (the president himself) use the identical word for two different jobs - check whether même comes before or after to know which meaning is meant.

See also

• French adjective agreement - the ordinary agreement rules autre and même mostly follow.
• French demonstratives - ce, cet, cette, ces, the "definite" cousins of this indefinite family.
• French quel and lequel - another small word family that changes shape with the noun it points at.