Learn French
with Audio Stories

Try for Free

HOME > FRENCH SAYINGS

The French saying "Les bons comptes font les bons amis"

Get ready to learn all the things you have to know about the basic saying "Les bons comptes font les bons amis". To be clear, this includes a complete guide of what it mean and how you can use it in a conversation with an audio example. Together with the cool stuff we sprinkled like synonyms, slow pronunciation audio, dialogue example and more!


Translation in English

  • Translation : A debt paid is a friend kept

  • Literal meaning : Good accounts make good friends

  • Register : Neutral - Basic

How to pronounce it?

Slow

Normal

  • IPA : / le bɔ̃ kɔ̃t fɔ̃ le bɔ̃z‿ ami /

aesthetic french quote bons comptes font les bons amis

Learn French
with Audio Stories

Try for Free

What does it mean exactly?

Definition

It literally means:

This proverb means that in order to maintain the friendship, each must pay their respective debts. There are two similar proverbs in English: "Short reckonings make long friends" and "A debt paid is a friend kept".

Because when you owe your friends money and take a lot of time to pay back or don't payback at all, the friendship is likely to suffer from this situation. So if you're borrowing money from a good friend, it's best to return the money as soon as possible.

How to use

If a friend is taking a lot of time to refund you and it pisses you off, you can use "Les bons comptes font les bons amis" as a reminder (and a minor threat...) that your friendship might suffer if this situation doesn't change soon.

On the other hand, if you owe a friend money you can say: "Je vais te rembourser dès que possible, les bons comptes font les bons amis" which means "I will refund you as soon as possible, good accounts make good friends". In this case, it means you value the friendship and will honestly do your best to honor your debt quickly.

Synonyms / Related

Example in a dialogue

Dialogue

Tiens, voilà l'argent que je te devais

Here is the money I owed you

Merci !

Thank you!

De rien ! Les bons comptes font les bons amis

Good accounts make good friends

Learn French with Audio Stories

Learn French the easy way with our French - English
parallel texts with slow French audio

Start Learning

← PREVIOUS

La nuit porte conseil

BACK

To vocabulary list

NEXT →

Avec des si, on mettrait Paris en bouteille