Encore vs Toujours: Still, Again and Always, Untangled

Two little adverbs, four English meanings — encore and toujours overlap just enough to be confusing. The fix is knowing which meanings belong to which word, and where the two genuinely trade places.

What toujours owns

• Always (habits): Il est toujours en retard. — He’s always late.
• Still (continuing states): Tu habites toujours à Lyon ? — Do you still live in Lyon?

What encore owns

• Again: Il a encore oublié ses clés. — He forgot his keys AGAIN. (Note the exasperation — encore carries it beautifully.)
• More: Encore du café ? — More coffee? / Tu veux encore jouer ? — again/more.
• Still (ongoing actions): Il dort encore. — He’s still asleep.
• Yet, in the negative: Pas encore. — Not yet.

The shared zone: “still”

For “still”, both often work: « Il pleut encore » ≈ « Il pleut toujours ». Nuance: encore leans “still going on (and it may stop)”, toujours leans “as before, unchanged”. In the NEGATIVE they split cleanly:

« Le train n’est pas encore là » (calm) vs « Le train n’est toujours pas là ! » (checking your watch, sighing in French).

Encore’s hidden job: “even”

One meaning most textbooks skip: in front of a comparative, encore means “even”.

• C’est encore mieux. — It’s even better.
• Il fait encore plus froid qu’hier. — It’s even colder than yesterday.
• C’était encore pire. — It was even worse.

Toujours can’t take this job — « toujours mieux » just means “always better” (or “still better”), never “even better”. When you want to crank a comparison up a notch, encore is your word.

Common mistakes to unlearn

Three traps I hear every week:

• Saying « Il est encore en retard » to mean “he’s always late”. A French ear hears “late AGAIN” — one more event, not a habit. For the character flaw, you want toujours: Il est toujours en retard.
• Saying « Je n’ai pas toujours fini » for “I haven’t finished yet”. That actually means “I haven’t always finished” — an odd confession. Not yet is pas encore, every time: Je n’ai pas encore fini.
• Ordering “more coffee” with plus. In everyday speech the ne of negation vanishes, so « je veux plus de café » — said without the final s sound of plus — means “I don’t want any MORE coffee”. Zero coffee arrives. Encore du café dodges the whole minefield.

At the café: both words in the wild

— Alors, Marc n’est toujours pas là ?
— Non, pas encore. Il a encore raté son bus.
— Encore ! Bon… tu veux encore un café, en attendant ?
— Volontiers. Au fait, il habite toujours à Lyon, Marc ?
— Oui, toujours.

Five flavours in five lines: toujours pas (still not — foot tapping), pas encore (not yet — calm), encore raté (missed it again), encore un café (one more), toujours à Lyon (still there, unchanged). Read it aloud twice and the pairs start sorting themselves.

A memory anchor

Toujours is literally tous + jours — “all days”. If the idea stretches over all the days — always, or still-as-before — it’s toujours. Everything built on repetition or addition — again, more, one more, not yet — belongs to encore. When in doubt, ask yourself: habit or rerun?

FAQ

Does encore mean “encore!” like at a concert?

That’s where English borrowed it — but French audiences actually shout « Une autre ! » or « Bis ! ». Real French encore is the everyday again/more/still word.

What is « encore une fois »?

One more time / once again: Répète encore une fois. You’ll also hear toujours in the philosophical sense: c’est toujours ça (at least that’s something).

Where do these adverbs go in the sentence?

After the conjugated verb: il dort encore, il est toujours là. In the passé composé, between auxiliary and participle: il a encore oublié. Same slot as the frequency adverbs on the frequency adverbs chart.

More time-talk: depuis, pendant & il y a and the expressing time chart.

Quick practice