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📚 This is the overview. « mettre » is taught level by level — pick your CEFR level below for a full lesson (explanation, pronunciation, exercises & games).
The same verb grows with your level — from your first words to real native slang.
Five phrases with « mettre » — guess before the reveal. Practise with the free games → Open this short as a page — transcript included →
Mettre — to put, to place, to put on — is an irregular verb with a mercifully small table: je mets, tu mets, il met (one t), then nous mettons, vous mettez, ils mettent (two t’s — the double letter marks the spoken stem, exactly like prendre’s double n). The passé composé is j’ai mis, one of French’s shortest past participles, and the rest of the conjugation behaves: imparfait je mettais, futur je mettrai, conditionnel je mettrais, subjonctif que je mette. To conjugate mettre is mostly to remember which side of the one-t/two-t border each form lives on — say the present aloud down the table and the border installs itself.
The verb earns its chart through family and phrases. The family: promettre (promise), permettre (allow), admettre, soumettre, remettre (put back / hand over / postpone) all conjugate identically — j’ai promis, il permet, nous remettons. The phrases run daily life: mettre la table (set the table), mettre du temps (take time), se mettre à + infinitive (to start doing — « il s’est mis à pleuvoir », it started raining), and the wardrobe sense — « je mets un pull » — which makes mettre the clothing lesson’s favourite verb. In context, one drill covers the lot: narrate getting dressed and setting breakfast in the present, then in the passé composé — mis, promis, permis will follow you politely ever after.
« Mis » — j’ai mis. The family copies it: promis, permis, admis, remis, soumis. « Promis ! » alone means “I promise!”.
Everything in -mettre: promettre, permettre, admettre, remettre, soumettre, transmettre, commettre. One table, eight verbs.
To start doing something: « je me suis mis à apprendre le français ». With weather: « il se met à pleuvoir » — it’s starting to rain.
Elle ___ du sucre dans son café. (mettre, present)
met
Hier, j’___ une heure pour venir. (mettre, passé composé)
ai mis
___ tes chaussures ! (mettre, imperative (tu))
Mets
« promettre » : passé composé → j’ai ___ (past participle)
promis
Il se ___ à pleuvoir. (se mettre à, passé composé)
est mis
je ___ (Mettre — present)
mets
tu ___ (Mettre — passé composé)
as mis
il ___ (Mettre — imperfect)
mettait
nous ___ (Mettre — future)
mettrons
vous ___ (Mettre — conditional)
mettriez
Go further: this chart is one small piece — get the full picture in our guide Master the present tense — the full beginner guide.
je mets, tu mets, il / elle met, nous mettons, vous mettez, ils / elles mettent. Full charts for every tense are above, each form with audio.
mis — the passé composé is « j’ai mis ». Mettre uses avoir as its auxiliary verb.
« je mettrai » — the future stem never changes across persons, only the endings do.
to put. It is one of the essential French verbs — drill the present first, then the passé composé; those two tenses carry most conversations.
Games built from this exact page — turn what you just read into play:

« mettre » at every CEFR level — the tense, its forms and the mechanic that makes it stick. Practise it with the free games →