🖨️ Print-friendly: use Ctrl+P (⌘P) or your browser menu to print this chart cleanly.
📚 This is the overview. « vivre » is taught level by level — pick your CEFR level below for a full lesson (explanation, pronunciation, exercises & games).
Five phrases with « vivre » — guess before the reveal. Practise with the free games → Open this short as a page — transcript included →
Vivre — to live, to be alive, to experience — conjugates short in the singular and honest in the plural: je vis, tu vis, il vit, nous vivons, vous vivez, ils vivent. The past participle is the table’s crown jewel: vécu — j’ai vécu — a word French also uses as a noun (le vécu: lived experience). Imparfait je vivais, futur je vivrai, subjonctif que je vive — and there stands the most famous subjunctive in the language: Vive la France ! — literally “may France live”, the subjunctive of wishes fossilised into a national exclamation. Reading trap worth one glance: the passé simple of VOIR is also « je vis » (I saw) — in novels, context tells you whether someone lived or looked.
The choosing rule: vivre vs habiter. Habiter is purely residential — j’habite à Lyon (address). Vivre covers residence AND existence: je vis à Lyon, je vis seul, ils vivent bien (they live well). If it’s about the address, either works; if it’s about the LIFE, only vivre. The family: survivre (survive — j’ai survécu) and revivre (relive) copy every form. Phrases with pulse: « on ne vit qu’une fois » (you only live once — French said it first), « vivre de » (live off: il vit de sa musique), « facile à vivre » (easy-going — literally easy to live with). Drill: describe your living in three layers — where (je vis à…), how (je vis bien), how long (j’ai vécu deux ans à…) — and vécu joins your own vocabulary of experience.
« Vécu » — j’ai vécu. As a noun, le vécu = lived experience; survivre matches with survécu.
Habiter = reside (address only); vivre = live (address, lifestyle, existence). « Je vis seul » can’t take habiter; « j’habite ici » can take either.
“May France live” — the present subjunctive of vivre as a wish. Same structure in vive les vacances, vive la mariée.
passé composé : elle a ___ (participle)
vécu
reside (address) = ___ · live (life) = ___ (the pair)
habiter · vivre
Long live the king! = ___ le roi ! (exclamation)
Vive
je ___ (Vivre — present)
vis
tu ___ (Vivre — passé composé)
as vécu
il ___ (Vivre — imperfect)
vivait
nous ___ (Vivre — future)
vivrons
vous ___ (Vivre — conditional)
vivriez
Go further: Master the present tense — the full beginner guide.
je vis, tu vis, il / elle vit, nous vivons, vous vivez, ils / elles vivent. Full charts for every tense are above, each form with audio.
vécu — the passé composé is « j’ai vécu ». Vivre uses avoir as its auxiliary verb.
« je vivrai » — the future stem never changes across persons, only the endings do.
to live. 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:
« vivre » at every CEFR level — the tense, its forms and the mechanic that makes it stick. Practise it with the free games →