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The French sentence "Je m'appelle…" revealed

Are you ready to learn all the things you ever wanted to know about the basic phrase “Je m’appelle…”?

It includes a detailed explanation of what it is and how to use it in everyday life with an audio example. And because we want you to make progress in French, we also sprinkled super useful stuff like slow pronunciation audio, dialogue example and more!

In addition, you will find more phrases explained like this one on this page and all our French words tutorials on this page. Enjoy!

Translation in English

How to pronounce it?

Slow pronunciation

Normal pronunciation

What does je m'appelle… mean?

Definition

“Je m’appelle…” is the most common way to say “My name is…” in French.

How to use it

In French, there are many ways to say “What’s your name“. So, if someone asks you one of these:

Comment tu t’appelles ?
Comment t’appelles tu ?
Comment vous appelez vous ? (Formal)
Quel est ton nom ?
Quel est votre nom ? (Formal)
C’est quoi ton nom ?
C’est quoi votre nom ? (Formal)
Ton nom ?
Votre nom ? (Formal)
Nom ?

Then you can answer :

Jean Dupont → Jean Dupont
Je m’appelle Jean Dupont → My name is Jean Dupont
Mon nom est Jean Dupont → My name is Jean Dupont
Je suis Jean Dupont → I am Jean Dupont

And if instead of “Nom” (Name) we asked you specifically for your “Prénom” (First name):

Jean → Jean
Je m’appelle Jean→ My (first) name is Jean
Mon prénom est Jean→ My first name is Jean
Je suis Jean → I am Jean

Finally, if we asked you specifically for your “Nom de famille” (Last name / Surname):

Dupont → Dupont
Je m’appelle Dupont→ My (last) name is Dupont
Mon nom de famille est Dupont→ My last name is Dupont

Example in a story with French audio

Now, let’s see a complete example of this phrase in a story with slow French audio and the English translation below.

La rentrée à l'université

Back to university

___

C’était le premier jour d’Emily dans un nouveau pays et une nouvelle ville.

It was the first day of Emily in a new country and a new city.

C’était aussi le jour où elle découvrait sa nouvelle université.

It was also the day she was discovering her new university.

Elle entra dans l’université et se dirigea vers l’accueil.

She entered the university and headed for the reception.

Une fois arrivée, elle dit :

Once there, she said:

Emily: Bonjour, je m’appelle Emily, je suis une nouvelle étudiante en échange.

Hello, my name is Emily, I am a new exchange student.

Le réceptionniste demanda à un étudiant de faire visiter les lieux à Emily.

The receptionist asked a student to take Emily for a tour of the place.